Chicago's Geriatric Care Manager Center of Excellence – Since 1991 • home care servicesChicago's Geriatric Care Manager Center of Excellence

No Vaccine for the Other Plague
You’re fortunate that you haven’t contracted COVID, and you may even have received your first dose of a vaccine,...
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February 16, 2021
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Until the Vaccine?
We have all been following the news on vaccine rollouts, and frankly you may have been as disappointed as...
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January 26, 2021
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How the COVID Vaccines Work
If you’re like me, you have been following too much news on the pandemic, but hopefully you also have...
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December 15, 2020
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COVID’s Other Deadly Toll
During this pandemic, over 13,000 more Alzheimer’s and other dementia patients have died than expected from these cognitive disorders,...
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September 22, 2020
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Hold Your Friends Close and Stangers Closer
Miss your friends, your older loved ones and those summer get togethers in the backyard? We can get together...
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August 11, 2020
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Dementia: We’re Not Post-COVID Yet
If you have a family member or loved one with dementia, this pandemic and its restrictions have been exponentially...
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May 26, 2020
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Distance Caregiving Through a Wall
I’ve written numerous times about distance caregiving, and one of the observations I have offered is that distance is...
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May 19, 2020
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Caregiving During COVID: Four Tips for Reengagement
You may recall that I have recommended limiting your news consumption, because it really does add to our stressed...
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May 12, 2020
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Tips for Distance Caregiving: Up Close and Personal at a Distance
If you think being a caregiver to an older loved one is hard–with all the trips to help them...
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February 4, 2020
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Mittens Before the Frost
I was asked today about the “mitten test.” It was one of our colleagues who had remembered something I...
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September 18, 2018
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In the Caregiver's Words

Recent Client Praise

Miss your friends, your older loved ones and those summer get togethers in the backyard? We can get together at distance with friends and family in manageable numbers while maintaining distance, but there is no chatting around the water cooler or dropping by the grandparents or social hour at a local establishment like there once was. All of that is mostly lost, at least if you’ve been following the guidelines, and the isolation you and your older loved ones feel is not unique. Odd to talk about isolation and then offer that you are not alone, but… Research is showing that strangers may be every bit as important to your emotional well-being and your older loved ones’ well-being as the friends that you all may now be missing. If you’re like a lot of folks, you are walking more, perhaps with a dog in tow. Or you many be shopping for groceries in the less crowded grocery stores. Or you may be at home to have the mail delivered as your retired parents are and meet the letter carrier or the delivery person from those on-line purchases we all have been making in greater number. I am not exactly an extrovert, but I always make it a point to at least say hello to all of these people with whom I have casual contact. And my husband, the extrovert in the family, may spend minutes chatting up a neighbor we had not met until the recent months or the person from the pizza parlor who delivered tonight’s guilty pleasure or someone eight blocks from home on his long walks with our now physically fit dog. Well, those casual encounters may be helping his and my mental health in a way that we used to think only close friends or confidents could according to a book I came across. The book, titled “Consequential Strangers,” is co-authored by a psychologist and a science reporter who analyzed the importance of those “weak ties” that we all have on a daily basis. In fact, the authors contend, those strangers are as important as family in best friends in giving us a strong grounding in the world. And the authors further point out that the more ties we have with “consequential strangers” the less likely one is to become depressed. Some of the benefits also include better sleep patterns, more productive work effort and just about all of those parts of daily living we value. To truly be healthier during this extended break from normal, ask strangers how they are faring…and then how their family’s health is…and maybe what they have been bingeing lately. You will have primed the pump for your better health. Now, do the same for your older family members and friends and you are passing it forward. Remember, we all will get through this, and we will get through it in much better shape if we hold our strangers closer. 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. She also is the co-author of How Do I Know You? A Caregiver’s Lifesaver for Dealing with Dementia.
Nearly fifty million people in America suffer from some sort of hearing impairment, and most of these are from exposure to loud noise that has damaged the little hairs, or cilia, that conduct sound. You cannot restore hearing in such cases, but you can help conduct sound to the remaining, healthy cilia to maximize the ability to hear. If you or a loved one is shopping for an assistive device to enhance hearing, here are five features you will want to know about as you compare options:
- Telecoil: is a tiny copper wire that can pick up sound directly from electronic devices such as phones or public address systems. Many concert halls send out magnetic waves which conduct the music or sound directly to these receivers.
- Directional Microphone: This “smart” receiver actually finds where the sound is emanating and focuses on it. You will hear terms like directional versus omnidirectional which means simply that the device focuses on the speaker in front of a person versus listens to all sources. It can be very helpful in crowded areas with lots of noise.
- Feedback Suppression: We all have been in auditoriums where the sound system gave that loud squawking feedback. It can happen with hearing aids as well if a phone receiver is too close to the ear, and this feature eliminates the squawk.
- Digital Noise Reduction: Again, in noisy settings there can be a lot of other sounds that intrude on a conversation or hearing the music, etc. This feature simply improves the quality of sound by eliminating these unwanted background noises.
- Everything Else: New features are popping up all the time. Bluetooth technology streams sounds directly from an electronic source like a TV, computer or smartphone. Some devices give a low pitch indicator noise when batteries are running low while still others limit wax build-up on a device while it is in the ear canal. The list goes on.
If you or a loved one with a hearing need is shopping, make a list and look at the value that each feature can bring, because there are cost differences across options. Be a smart consumer. And remember – you heard it here first! 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@creativecaremanagement.com.
Who thinks it’s a good idea to just blow off Valentine’s Day? I am guessing not many hands will go up for that idea…some might even say that their spouse will kill them if they don’t bring forth at least a sentimental thought. Never mind the flowers, candy or sparkler. Just forget about the day later this week. Well, that probably is what some of us do every day … with our hearts…we just forget about our hearts. And that is why heart attack and stroke are the top two causes of mortality in the United States. So, what do you do to remember of your hearts? Earlier this decade the American Heart Association came up with seven habits to embrace to help avoid heart attack and stroke. You don’t have to wait until February 14^th to start:
1. Exercise - there is a new exercise program recommended almost every week, it seems, but the simple fact is that getting your body moving regularly and vigorously supports a healthy heart…and the rest of the body with it.
2. Eat right - we all know what the good foods are and what the bad foods are; make a healthy diet your Valentine’s Day resolution.
3. Lower blood pressure - you will need a medical provider to give you your actual numbers (not to exceed 12/80), and if your numbers are high stick to the prescription you will be given and follow #1 and #2 along with losing weight and cutting your salt or sugar intake.
4. Lower your cholesterol - focus your diet on fruits and vegetables along with fish, nuts and soy; your doctor can tell you if a statin is indicated.
5. Manage your blood sugar - sugar is not your friend, so limit its visits to your body in order to keep down your weight and not beat up your pancreas…your heart will thank you.
6. Maintain a healthy weight - losing weight should be an outcome of the first 5 instead of a goal in itself, but keeping your weight down lightens the workload for your heart.
7. Don’t smoke - smokers have double the risk of a heart attack and triple the risk of a stroke over nonsmokers; it is not just your lungs that suffer if you smoke.
So this list is the short version of a lot of material I have covered in other posts. If you have questions, you can use key words to search the blog for a related post or you can go to the American Heart Association web site. Make February your heart-healthy month! 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. She also is the co-author of How Do I Know You? A Caregiver’s Lifesaver for Dealing with Dementia.
You have heard about how “brain teasers” or other “brain games” like crossword puzzles are helpful in keeping a brain healthy, and they are. Working an older person’s body – and for that matter the body of a person of any age – also improves cognitive function. I did say “any age.” Getting into better physical shape to also be in better mental shape works for caregivers and for their older care receivers. If you are a caregiver to an older loved one, you may want to encourage their physical – and mental – fitness by example. Researchers have studied individuals across the age spectrum to measure this association between physical fitness and mental fitness. What they consistently find is that even small changes in physical fitness can improve cognitive function at the same time the individuals improve their strength and muscular conditioning. The mental component where they see the difference is the executive function, the part of the brain responsible for focus, adaptive behavior and sorting short and long term memory. The area in the brain where much of this happens is the hippocampus, an area that sadly shrinks with age starting in later adulthood. As the hippocampus goes through this natural regression, the individual’s memory becomes increasingly impaired and they may also become at risk for dementia. Hippocampus atrophy is considered inevitable as a person ages, but research has demonstrated that aerobic exercise can regrow the hippocampus by adding the proteins that aid in the growth of new brain cells. Now, the scientists are not saying that if you go out for a brisk walk or jog today that you will be smarter tomorrow…at least not measurably so. What they have found, however, is that people who consistently embrace even a modest exercise program for as little as a year can make a measureable difference in their cognitive fitness. Can this reverse the effects of dementia? Unfortunately, in cases where amyloid beta plaque already has begun to form, there can be no reversal. But there is every indication that a consistent exercise program can slow the progression of a dementia, and this is all that is promised by any of the medications currently available from your physician. So, just as you would not wait until you are ill to begin exercising to get fit, you should not wait until there are significant signs of cognitive decline to start an exercise program. The other takeaway from this growing body of research is that the “fitness message” is for caregivers every bit as much as it is for the older loved ones for whom they care. It is never too early to take steps to care for the brain, and the more steps the better. 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@creativecaremanagement.com.
This is the first in a series of posts on dementia in advance of the release of my new book, "How Do I Know You? A Caregiver’s Lifesaver for Dealing with Dementia." It will be released in July through Family Solutions Press of Los Angeles and available from Amazon. We will keep you up to date on details. Count slowly from one to sixty-seven…one thousand one, one thousand two, one thousand three…by the time you reach one thousand sixty-seven, one more person in the United States will have been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease. In fact, one in three Americans ultimately will die with Alzheimer’s disease. And when we interviewed nearly three dozen Professional Care Managers in 2016 and 2017 dementia was the most common issue they dealt with among their clients– more than 66% of their cases. There have been new diagnostic breakthroughs and some pharmacological, nutritional and other ways that have proposed to help slow the progression of this disease, but the fact is that they have no substantial or durable effect. Alzheimer’s remains the only disease in the top ten causes of death in the United States that cannot be prevented, cured or slowed. Dementia is a category that includes about 100 specific cognitive conditions. Generally speaking, most dementias are diagnoses of exclusion. That is medical talk for the fact that one narrows down what a person is manifesting by successive steps of eliminating other possible explanations for a behavior. For instance, a medical work-up when dementia is suspected will include a review of all the medications a patient may be taking. Some medications have a pronounced effect on a person’s memory, noteworthy among them most of the sleep aids such as diphenhydramine, or Benadryl. Yet, this typically results in memory lapses that will recede if the medication is stopped. Doctors now also talk about “risk factors” for dementia that they place into three major categories. The first they tie to “body composition.” Simply put, what physicians have noted is that people with more fatty tissue, or a higher Body Mass Index (BMI), is associated with more amyloid deposits on the brain, a precursor of Alzheimer’s. The second set of risk factors center on “inflammatory processes.” Increased blood levels of sugar and cholesterol are associated with higher risk of dementia as well as heart disease…something of a double hit. Finally physicians also look at how well a person scores on “cognitive tests.” Dementia often is thought of as forgetfulness, but it really is the inability to process information and make a retrievable memory. They have cognitive tests that can measure that, one of which they call the Mini-Mental Test. A person’s cognitive health also is enhanced by creative pass times like playing a musical instrument, taking adult education or actively engaging in stress reduction. In my book, we cover what we know about dementia, what can be done to stave off the effects of dementia and most importantly what caregivers can do for their loved ones with dementia and for themselves. 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.
“We are what we eat” is an old adage that takes on new meaning with some research recently published by a nutritionist at Rush University Medical Center. According to findings reported by Martha Claire Morris, a Ph.D. nutritional epidemiologist at Rush University, a diet high in the right fruits and vegetables among other foods is a significant deterrent to late onset Alzheimer’s Disease. The researchers in Rush’s Memory and Aging Project followed a group of 954 patients whose average age at the study outset was 81 years, tracking their diets and also monitoring their mental abilities for five years. It is important to point out that with this older age group – unlike younger adults - genetic issues play a very small role in developing AD, but the researchers found that diet did. Participants who followed a “brain healthy” diet reduced their risk of developing AD by as much as 35% to 53%. A brain healthy diet includes vegetables, especially green, leafy vegetables like kale and spinach. It also includes beans, nuts, berries and whole grains. The berries that packed the biggest preventative punch were blueberries. Fish and poultry were the primary meats in the diet, and the diet also included olive oil and wine (sorry…only one glass a day). As important as consuming the good foods is avoiding the “bad diet.” On the list of foods to avoid in order to maintain brain health are red meats and fried or fast foods. And if you have a sweet tooth, you may need to retrain it as sweets and pastries are also taboo. Finally, cheese and butter are unhealthy for cognitive health…at least in amounts that exceed about a tablespoon of butter a day. As the researchers reported, it is not a surprise that the “brain healthy” foods are high in vitamin K, but they cannot say it is vitamin K alone or whether something else in combination with this vitamin that helps brain health. They also caution that this is not a predictive study, but given that the results square with other research on “brain healthy” foods their findings suggest that we can use these foods to good benefit. To learn more about the research and how nutrition is part of your brain health, visit the Rush University Medical Center web site (click here). And then head out to the grocer and grab a bunch of kale. 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@creativecaremanagement.com.