Older Adults Health Care : Home-Care Helpers

by Food and Drug Administration (FDA)

(Page 2 of 3)

Some senior citizens require home care to live comfortably and safely. When friends and family are unable to provide that help, professionals can often meet those needs, which vary considerably from person to person.

A man or woman severely disabled by arthritis, for example, can hire a part-time homemaker to shop and clean. Meals on Wheels, a service available in most communities, can provide hot meals. Someone recovering from a stroke or other illness may temporarily need physical, occupational or speech therapy as well as a home health aide to assist with personal care.

The mainstays of home care are nurses, homemakers or health aides, social workers, therapists, and physicians. Visiting nurses provide hands-on care such as changing bandages and checking blood pressure, heart rate, and other vital signs. Nurses also teach patients or family members how to do some of the medical tasks, such as giving injections. In most home health-care situations, the nurse also identifies any additional services a client may need, such as physical therapy.

Homemakers shop, cook and clean for their clients. Home health aides provide additional help such as bathing, walking, dressing, and administering oral medications. Sometimes, all that's needed to avoid a nursing home is help with bathing and dressing.

Social workers help geriatric patients and their families find the services and agencies they need. They also help patients and their families cope with the stresses of illness and disability.

Physical therapists provide home patients with exercise and other therapies they need to relieve pain and restore muscle strength. Occupational therapists pinpoint home devices such as grab bars that enable more independence. They also teach techniques that aid in daily living activities, such as how to dress with the use of just one hand. Speech pathologists teach hearing-impaired individuals how to read lips and help stroke patients and other speech-impaired individuals recover their ability to talk.

Physicians authorize the home health-care plan. They periodically review the effectiveness of home-care services and recommend any necessary changes.

Some home health-care services are covered under Medicare or private insurance policies. Your local Social Security office can tell you what services are covered by Medicare.

High Tech at Home

Recent advances in technology have reduced many types of bulky medical equipment to a more portable size, enabling many patients to leave the hospital more quickly following a major illness. For those afflicted with chronic ailments, home medical equipment can also prevent a hospital stay.

Cardiac patients' heart rhythms can be monitored at home, for example, by portable devices consisting of an electrode placed on the chest and attached to a small electronic box worn in a pocket or pouch by the patient.

Some cardiac patients' lives have been saved in their own homes by a telephone defibrillator system. If the patient has symptoms such as chest pain, palpitations, or shortness of breath, the patient or caregiver places a defibrillator pad containing electrodes on the patient's chest. The electrodes detect the patient's heartbeat pattern, and an electrocardiogram (EKG) is sent to a base station through the telephone lines. Medical personnel at the base station evaluate the EKG and, if necessary, activate the defibrillator on the patient's chest so that it gives brief electric shocks. These shocks can help stabilize or restore a patient's heartbeat until emergency medical personnel arrive on the scene.

There are a number of portable oxygen systems that help ease the chronic shortness of breath characteristic of emphysema and chronic bronchitis. These chronic obstructive pulmonary diseases are second only to heart disease as a cause of disability, according to the Social Security Administration.

Usually people with these respiratory conditions receive oxygen from large tanks or a device that concentrates the oxygen in room air. Oxygen is delivered to the patient through a tube that is either placed in the nose or surgically inserted into the neck. When they need to leave their homes, people can also sling a handbag-like sack of oxygen over their shoulders. This convenient oxygen container is filled from a tank of oxygen kept at home.

After initial training, many people can administer their own supplemental oxygen without supervision. The frequency of administration varies with the severity of the disability.

"Some people need oxygen constantly," says FDA's Marcia Withiam-Wilson, M.S.N., a nurse consultant to FDA, "whereas other people just need it whenever they exert themselves — when they walk some distance, for example, but not when they are sitting in a chair."

Intravenous (IV) care equipment is also available for home use. Some people can receive cancer chemotherapy intravenously in their own homes with the instruction and supervision of a home nurse. IV equipment can also be used in the home to give antibiotics to people with infections such as pneumonia or osteomyelitis, a bone infection common in the elderly. Home use of IV antibiotics can allow an earlier hospital discharge of some patients with pneumonia, for example.

About the Author

www.fda.gov
FDA is A United States government body that oversees medical devices, including contact lenses, intraocular lenses, excimer lasers and eyedrops. In the US, these products must be approved by the FDA before they can be marketed.