The later stages of dementia become far more difficult for your senior. She may be nonverbal at this point, which means that you’re left guessing a bit as to what she needs and when she needs it. Keeping your senior comfortable is also a big part of helping her to avoid problems with her skin, so it’s really important.
Position Changes Relieve Pressure
Changing positions helps to relieve pressure on your senior’s skin and joints. This alleviates issues that can lead to problems with bed sores later on. The key to helping your senior to change positions easily is to know what to do and to know when it’s time to do it. Keeping track of how long it’s been since your senior last changed positions can help quite a bit.
Help Her to Move Properly
There are right ways and wrong ways to help your senior to switch up her positioning. If you’re moving her in a way that puts pressure on your own joints and muscles, you risk injury. What can help quite a lot is for you to work with hospice care providers to learn the proper body mechanics to move your senior’s position.
Hand Her Something Before You Help Her to Shift Positions
Something that can help is to hand your senior something that she can hold onto before you help her to shift her position. This is helpful because she may reach out and hold onto you while you’re trying to help her to move, which makes everything that much more difficult. When you hand her something, especially something that she loves to hold, that’s going to occupy her attention until you’re finished.
Put Together a Stash of Cushioning Tools
Something else that helps is to have tools at the ready that enable you to make your senior’s situation more comfortable for her. That might mean using cushions, soft blankets, towels, and more to help her to stay in one position and to have some soft barriers to lean against. Collecting a variety of these types of cushioning tools can help you to have just what your senior needs in a specific situation.
Staying alert to your senior’s individual signs of discomfort is going to help you immensely with keeping her comfortable. Look also for cues from your hospice care providers. They have experience in spotting discomfort in nonverbal patients and can help you to learn what it looks like when your senior needs to move.
If you or your aging loved one could benefit from Hospice Care in Bamberg SC, contact the caring staff at Grove Park Hospice, (803) 536-6644.
- Three Keys to Help Prepare an Aging Senior for Home Care Support - October 9, 2020
- Five Reasons Your Senior Experiences Discomfort Near the End of Her Life - September 23, 2020
- Thank You Hospice Team! - September 17, 2020
