Translated…
The caretaking of the demented elderly population is in need of more research still, in the past, if considerations in the quality of life and the cost of living, the mildly demented individuals would fare the best at home; and, as dementia progressed, institutionalization seemed to be the better option.
But, the reality isn’t as clear cut as the studies. I’d met a lot of families, although the patients were slowly progressing into the severely demented categories, with the onset of various psychoses, the families still insisted on having the elderly at home, and, no matter how hard it got, most families could persist through the process too.
Her Husband Became Violent, the Wife Bore with the Changes in Her Husband’s Temperament
Mr. Lee is a retired army officer, his wife is his primary caretaker, although they’re both elderly, but, their physical health conditions are still very good, and the children would often head home to visit them. In these couple of years, Mrs. Lee was troubled by her husband’s forgetfulness that’s getting more and more serious, as well as with his mood swings, but she thought that it was a normal process of aging, and just kept taking whatever he threw at her. But, Mr. Lee became more unstable emotionally and would blame her more and more, it made her feel scared, and, other than getting into verbal arguments with her, he’d lifted his hands to her too.
One day, her kids came running, as Mrs. Lee called out for help, because Mr. Lee got so furious with something, he’d started hitting his wife, even taken up a knife, to attack her. After the children took Mr. Lee to see the doctor, the doctor confirmed that he’s become severely demented. The hospital suggested to the family members, that Mr. Lee be place in a specialty Alzheimer’s home. But because Mrs. Lee and her children didn’t want to separate from her husband, they’d turned down the suggestions of the doctor, and only placed Mr. Lee on medication.
When Placing the Elderly into a Facility, the Family Member Must Stay for a Week to Accompany the Demented Elderly
Mr. Lee’s condition would be unstable, sometimes, he’d be okay, and at others, he’d not be fine, although after he’d started taking his meds, the physical violence ceased, but, he’d become too drowsy and needed a lot of sleep, but after Mrs. Lee stopped Mr. Lee’s medication, he’d started becoming violent again. The children felt bad about what their mother was putting up with, decided to take Mr. Lee to a long-term care facility.
But, there are only a limited number of facilities that specializes in caring for the demented elderly population, at the end, they were introduced, to the Jia-Li Honorary Home, Mrs. Lee worried about her husband, and so, she’d decided to stay with him there for a week.
During the week, Mrs. Lee found, that all the residents in the home are very kind, if you don’t examine them closely, you wouldn’t know that they’re demented; and the nursing home unit has a lot of activities, with the nurses and nurses’ aides going to and fro, and the doctors kept on suggesting that they level off Mr. Lee’s medication, and use other methods to resolve his problems. She and the professional caretakers helped Mr. Lee to get involved in the various activities, and, she’d found, that Mr. Lee was no longer violent anymore, and, there were, less and less instances when he’d raised his hands to show his anger, in the end, she’d found, that her husband started showing that smile that she hadn’t seen in a very long while.
There are Tips to Caring for the Demented Elderly, the Rong Home Offers the Lessons
Mrs. Lee and the nurses discussed the matter for a very long time, turns out, she’d not known enough about Alzheimer’s, she’d always taken the measures of correcting and teaching her husband to behave himself, nor did she know how she could reduce his delusions from day to day. Every time she’d accompanied her husband to see the doctors, nobody taught her how to handle these situations, and just start subscribing a wide variety of medications for him, but, it’s, as if when he’d taken his meds, he’d become someone else entirely different.
Picking a High-Quality Nursing Home Unit, Better than Caring for the Demented Elderly at Home
Mrs. Lee asked her husband’s caretakers at the nursing home unit for some times, and, from the living environment, to handling of Mr. Lee’s words and behaviors, after a week, Mrs. Lee talked to the Health section of the home, she’d wanted to bring her husband home. The Rong Home supported her decision, and promised to assist her whenever and however they can.
The energies and love that goes into caring for the elderly population in Taiwan is rare in the world, this, is the character of a kind society, and because of this, we must, show support to the homecare takers. The good kind of care needed more than just love, and, understanding of dementia, and the tips to care for the demented elderly population, not just the medications can solve.
More importantly, when you get to the point when you can no longer take care of the individuals at home, choosing a high-quality care center is NOT abandoning your loved ones, it’s choosing a better lifestyle for the patients, the key is in the quality of life, and not just where the individual lives.
So, this just shows, how when you can no longer offer the needed care for the elderly loved ones who had become demented in your life, you shouldn’t feel guilty for sending them into a care facility, because the care facilities have better qualified nurses, staff, who are trained to take care of elderly with dementia.
Life, the Obstacle Course 