Chicago's Geriatric Care Manager Center of Excellence – Since 1991 | Chicago's Geriatric Care Manager Center of Excellence

Medicare Doesn’t Cover WHAT?!
Gregory Peebles is a Certified Senior Advisor (CSA), Certified Dementia Practitioner (CDP) and trained Medicare Counselor, whose work focuses...
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June 18, 2018
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Do You Sea a Hero in Yourself?
Associate Care Manager Gregory is a Certified Senior Advisor (CSA) and Certified Dementia Practitioner (CDP) whose work focuses on...
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June 4, 2018
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What May Flowers Bring
April showers are supposed to bring May flowers, but what does May bring? It brings Mental Health Awareness Month…among...
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May 28, 2018
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Five Tips for Winter Because It’s Not Spring Yet
There is a lot of advice that goes around for older loved ones in our orbits when we see...
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January 16, 2018
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Is This Normal?
As we age, our bodies give us feedback we’re not used to. Activities that never required a second thought...
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October 23, 2017
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Insta-Gram: It’s a Date!
Associate Care Manager Gregory Peebles returns with a series on the Internet and aging. Gregory is both a Certified...
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September 23, 2017
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Insta-Gram Part 2: The Internet and Aging Adults
Associate Care Manager Gregory Peebles returns with a series on the Internet and aging. Gregory is both a Certified...
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September 4, 2017
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What to Look for When Your Loved One Needs You But Can’t Ask
Associate Care Manager Gregory Peebles returns with a talk about hidden signals of aging that need our attention. Gregory...
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July 31, 2017
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A House is Not a Home (Part 3)
At CCM, home and safety are as important to us as to you, so it’s no surprise that it’s...
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June 18, 2017
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A House is Not a Home (Part 2)
At CCM, home and safety are as important to us as to you, so it’s no surprise that it’s...
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June 12, 2017
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In the Caregiver's Words

Recent Client Praise

It's June, and school is out for a lot of kids and everyone is thinking of taking time off. In fact, by a certain time of the year most people who are going to take a summer vacation will have made their plans. We all know how to make plans and make reservations to get to where we want to go. If we look beyond what month it is and think about seasons of our lives, we may also be thinking about retirement. By a certain time of life most people will have made retirement plans. We all know where to turn to get advice on how to make plans and maybe even a picture of where we would like to be once we become financially independent. As a geriatric care manager, let me suggest also that by a certain time of life most people will not have made plans for getting older. In fact, the plans that need to be made for getting older typically will not be made by an older adult, but rather by their caregivers. And the typical caregiver will not always know where to turn to make those plans for their older loved one. So, please allow me to share with you what is usually 60% of my first conversations with someone who e-mails us or makes a call as a way of explaining what a geriatric care manager does. Looking at that first example of summer vacations, it would be really great if there were a geriatric care equivalent to Travelocity. Or talking of retirement, it would be really easy if having a plan for getting older would be like following that arrow line in the television commercial. But there is hope. Making plans for getting older can be easier than a lot of caregivers think. The majority of the first conversations I have with clients are a lot about what they are looking for like: • home medical care for an older parent, or • a senior community where mom or dad can move or • where to go for what they see as the onset of dementia in a loved one. As the conversation unfolds, it usually becomes clear that what is needed first is an overall assessment and then a plan for the options available to support a loved one in maintaining their maximum quality of life. One of my associates calls us the "wedding planners" for getting older. To just get home care may be a bit like that wedding planner who just tells you where they have a great stock of wedding dresses when you were really looking to plan that "special day." To just get a list of senior communities in the area may ignore the other options for aging in place that could come from a full assessment leading to a plan. And it may be dementia or it may be interactions among any of the multiple medications that your loved one has been prescribed by multiple providers. What may be more helpful is someone to look at the big picture and help make a plan. If you are a caregiver, think about your concerns for your older loved one, but also consider looking into geriatric care managers. They are essential in providing an overall informed assessment and even more important for discovering all your options. The person who can best do that likely is the person who sees the big picture and knows all the resources available. Charlotte Bishop is founder of Creative Care Management, a team of geriatric care managers, certified professionals, advocates, resources, counselors and friends to older adults and their families in metropolitan Chicago. Please email your questions to info@creativecasemanagement.com.
Associate Care Manager Gregory Peebles returns with a series on the Internet and older adults. Gregory is both a Certified Senior Advisor (CSA) and Certified Dementia Practitioner (CDP) whose work focuses on helping aging adults and folks with limited independence by providing resources and support to help them discover and lead their best life. Gregory has been a part of CCM, Inc. for over a decade. – Charlotte The Internet is a safe place if you know how to navigate is safely. It’s user-friendly if, like the youngest generation, you grew up using it all the time. Most, however, have not had that advantage. We learned on our own, and any self-taught amateur will tell you that without a teacher, you can learn a lot of things wrong. There’s no shortage of helpful information on scams directed at older adults who have ventured onto the Internet. At CCM, we try to feature this type of content as it becomes available. Today’s post, however, is about common, globally unsafe habits from which we’ve witnessed our clients and their families struggle to recover. Have these conversations with your older loved one before you have to clean up a digital mess or reclaim a stolen identity.
1. Passwords. Plural. There should be a different password for each online account, and they should change with some frequency. It’s annoying, but at least it’s easy. You know the “best practices” – upper and lower case letters, numbers and even the “other” characters (@, #, etc.).
2. The Not-So-Funny Joke Forward. Sometimes a dangerous link gets inserted into those joke message forwards. Anyone curious/unlucky enough to click on it gets a nasty surprise. Tell your loved ones Don’t click on links unless they are in a personally directed communication from a trusted source.
3. Oversharing. Social media encourage us to tell everyone everything, first among which is how we feel, where we are, what we’re doing. Older adults - not as fluent in the standard practices of safety - are most likely to fall prey to those seeking to benefit from oversharing, an example of which might include updating a status about leaving town for a while. Predators are looking for exactly this type of information, especially if they know their prey’s address already.
4. Oversharing: The Sequel. Similarly, older adults are much more likely to give out personal information casually in a public forum (as in a comment). Not only will it overwhelm your loved one with junk mail, placing them at higher risk for scams, but someone looking to take advantage can get an incredible amount of information from just a name, a phone number, and an email address.
5. Shopping the Black Market. Non-secure websites don’t even pretend to protect your information. How can you tell if a website is secure? Nothing is 100%, but if the URL you’re shopping at does not begin with [https:], leave immediately. The extra “s” is for “secured”, and without it, online shopping becomes a huge risk. Noting this one thing can save lots of money and trouble.
Internet safety could be its own series, but with these five tips, we’re confident your loved one will be safe exploring all the Internet has to offer. Charlotte Bishop is an Aging Life Care Advisor, Geriatric Care Manager and founder of Creative Care Management, certified professionals who are geriatric advocates, resources, counselors and friends to older adults and their families in metropolitan Chicago.
When Medicare is defrauded by crooked providers, pharmacists, or any person posing as an expert who can make a telephone call or door to door solicitation, we all lose. Our tax dollars foot the bills. Anyone keeping an eye out for an elderly loved one knows the usual scams. The challenge is that the crooked folks keep coming up with new ploys to dupe Medicare recipients, and Medicare processes 4.4 million claims each day, all of which must be paid within 30 days. If you are a caregiver to a Medicare beneficiary or you, yourself are “of an age,” here are some of the latest scams.
1. Bait and Switch Okay, the notion of offering something that appears legitimate and of value, but then swapping it for something worth a lot less is not new. The latest scam, however, is new in that it promises a new high-tech osteoarthritis kit that “Medicare will reimburse.” So, the scammers promise state of the art, but they deliver cheap Velcro braces. And they bill Medicare for the high-end goods.
2. No Place Like Home Along the same lines of the bait and switch for arthritis, scammers have been known to deliver health services or other domestic help services to Medicare beneficiaries in their homes. But it is when the scammers turn around and up-bill Medicare for more costly professional services that the taxpayers get taken for a ride.
3. Mental Wealth Still another scam involves mental health services in outpatient settings. Medicare recipients are referred to an outpatient facility that in reality is just a social gathering. Socialization is good for one’s mental health, but the scammers up-charge Medicare for a psychological consultation instead. And as with the other scams, the taxpayers pick up the tab.
Medicare paid nearly one-quarter trillion dollars in 2013-the latest data available, and estimates of fraud range from 10% of this total to as high as 30%, but there are measures we all can take to help address these criminal activities. The federal Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services recommend: • Know your coverage under Medicare so that you are not duped by scammers. • Guard your Medicare number as closely as you do your social security number. • Beware of any medical service provider who reaches out to you unsolicited. • Ask your personal physician about any and all service or device prescriptions. • Scrutinize your monthly Medicare statements for anything unusual. • Say something if you see something…don’t hesitate to call 1-800-MEDICARE. All of this will help you or an older loved one to not fall victim to scammers, and it will keep the money with the taxpayers instead of the scammers. Charlotte Bishop is an Aging Life Care Professional and a Geriatric Care Manager and founder of Creative Care Management, certified professionals who are geriatric advocates, resources, counselors and friends to older adults and their families in metropolitan Chicago. Please email your questions to info@creativecaremanagement.com.
I have written in a number of blog postings and we also have had a number of guest contributions on how to facilitate good residential/moving decisions. There is no doubt that a senior residence takes away the burden of the household chores like mowing lawns, shoveling snow or heavy cleaning.   It also offers a greater sense of security, because the campuses of these centers typically are well-insulated from most community threats that can unsettle older adults aging in place. But as a caregiver to an older adult, don't think that all possible worries or headaches are going away.

            Here are some suggestions based on my experience with senior residential living:

1.    What happens if your older loved has a fall or other accident that demands attention? You will want to speak with the staff at a facility to identify what kinds of alert systems they have in place, who responds in the case of an emergency and where a loved one may be taken in the event of a medical emergency. You may find that you need to request or supply an alert mechanism for your loved one.

2.    Who is coordinating your loved one's medical care? Some - but not all - residences have transportation to and from medical appointments, but others simply leave that to the individual or family unless they are in assisted living. Check into the options available and if someone actually accompanies your older loved one to a medical appointment, be sure they record what is discussed, ask appropriate questions and be sure that all the providers are communicating and coordinating with one another.

3.    Is there a care plan for your older loved one? Almost all facilities have some level of health care present such as nurses who are available to check in on residents. Many also have physicians or other providers who will pay visits to attend to certain medical needs like foot care. But a care plan is really all about establishing clear goals for your loved one, identifying what will be done to reach the goals and who is responsible for what parts of the plan. Otherwise you are at risk for simply bouncing from one crisis to another.

4.    Is there stimulation for your loved one? One of the great things about senior communities is the relatively easy access to all those neighbors within a protected environment. There are structured activities and events on a fairly regular basis, but who really is attending to and caring for your loved one? The staff at most facilities are just too stretched to provide much personal attention to each of the residents, and without the stimulation from regular interpersonal contact an older loved one declines. If one does not use their social skills, they lose their sociability. You may need to get an aide to spend a certain amount of time with your loved one regularly to help them to be engaged.

            Charlotte Bishop is a Geriatric Care Manager and founder of Creative Case Management, certified professionals who are geriatric advocates, resources, counselors and friends to older adults and their families in metropolitan Chicago. Please email your questions to Charlotte (info@creativecasemanagement.com ).
When I talk to people about advocacy and geriatric care management, they get that part of what we do in our professional role is look out for older adults and guard against abuse of a variety of sorts. One of those kinds of abuse is financial abuse in the form of scams that target older adults. Scammers target older adults in part because, as a group, older adults can be more vulnerable, but older adults also are the ones who will have accumulated some amount of money over their lives - their nest eggs. But did you know that more than 90% of reported financial scams targeting seniors are perpetrated by their own family members? If you are a caregiver to an older adult or just a concerned person in the orbit of a senior, here are some of the common scams going around.
1. Meet you at the Funeral - Believe it or not, some scammers will go to a complete stranger's funeral claiming to the family or widow that money is owed for some prior contract or other obligation. But that is not all. Beware of the "add-ons" that some funeral homes may try to railroad at this vulnerable time in a family's loss. It is a really good reason that we all should make our own funeral arrangements before the time comes.
2. Boomers don't Age - With the boomers starting to fill the ranks of the over 65 cohort, there is a host of anti-aging products to assist those who feel 70 is the new 50. Help your senior to see through the false claims as well as the fake products posing as the brand names like Botox. And remember that if it is not fake in the case of Botox, that it Botox made from a deadly toxin; be certain of the recipe.
3. Fake Drugs - With pharmaceutical prices still a large part of any senior's budget, the lure of non-U.S. pharmacies is still there. Be sure that the distributors actually offer the real deal. FDA has been reporting an average of 20 major investigations of fake manufacturers every year.
4. Just Bill Medicare - Anyone over age 65 will qualify for Medicare to pay part of their medical costs. Some providers working the system, however, can purport to offer services and then bill Medicare. Since they can use your elder's personal information for a direct billing, the older patient will never be the wiser.
The list, of course, goes on. The reason why some of these frauds may happen is that they take advantage of a senior who is not as tech savvy on the web as younger web surfers may be. And at any age, we all can be victims of the deal that sounds too good to pass up. So, if you are a caregiver, lend an eye and an ear to that older adult in your orbit. Your vigilance will benefit them, and it also will give you the benefit of advance learning for when you are there one day. Charlotte Bishop is a Geriatric Care Manager and founder of Creative Care Management, certified professionals who are geriatric advocates, resources, counselors and friends to older adults and their families in metropolitan Chicago. Please email your questions to info@cr eativecaremanagement.com.
Of the estimated seven million Americans who have been full-time workers and caregivers, about six percent left the workforce for at least some amount of time to devote themselves full-time to caregiving. If you are one of these caregivers who are now rejoining the workforce, you may be wondering how "caregiving" fits on your resume.

First of all, appreciate that mothers or fathers of newborns or adoptees have been leaving the workforce and returning after raising children for years now. Having raised multiple children from birth to teen years, many of them have had much longer time away from work than a caregiver who takes leave for an older parent. That said, here are some lessons learned for how to dust off a resume:
1. First, don't lie about what we may refer to as your "caregiver gap;" trying to stretch earlier career positions to cover these months or years just will not work when a potential employer can check your story.
2. Make an explanation of this period that is comfortable and to the point; too many details can be a distraction and euphemisms just sound odd.
3. Include volunteer work that you may have been engaged in as well as any coursework you completed, conferences you attended or anything else to keep current.
4. Adapt your experiences for the specific jobs for which you will be applying; one size resume will not fit all applications.
5. There is a month for everything, and yes, September is International Update Your Resume Month, so check out resources on line (http://www.pongoresume.com/blogPosts/588/win-free-pongo-services-during-update-your-resume-month.cfm )
Resume in hand, start with these steps:
1. Restart your business network by tapping appropriate contacts within your social network like Facebook.
2. If you do not have a LinkedIn account, get that started as well with your business contacts from Facebook or your earlier jobs, and reach out to contacts of your contacts.
3. Call your former employer to see if they have freelance work available or new openings; a returning employee can "hit the ground running."
4. Check out college or continuing education courses that will get your skills current for today's job market.
5. Volunteer for a position in a non-profit that will use of the skills you have; such a position becomes a fresh line item for your career story.
6. And just as you may have done in your very first job search, seek out "informational interviews" with employers in your industry.
Throughout all of this, keep reminding yourself that what you did as a caregiver was important and valuable. And it was a full-time job, so you are not really restarting; you are just moving along your career path to your next job.

Charlotte Bishop is a Geriatric Care Manager and founder of Creative Care Management, certified professionals who are geriatric advocates, resources, counselors and friends to older adults and their families in metropolitan Chicago. Please email your questions to ccbishop@creativecasemanagement.com. Read more about Our Story and Charlotte's mission.