Community Services

• Companionship Services: These services may include companionship, home supervision, telephone reassurance and friendly visitors.
• Help around the house: Homemakers and home care aides do chores such as laundry, cooking, errands, shopping and some help with bathing and dressing. Home repair services perform minor repairs and maintenance.
• Meal Programs: Meal can be delivered to the home (Meals on Wheels or Home Delivered Meals). Other meal options include other settings, such as senior centers and other such places that offer senior discounts.
• Transportation: Organizations give older persons rides to doctors, shops, senior centers or adult day care centers.

• Home Health Aides: The workers may perform personal care and medical tasks such as giving medicines, bathing, or assisting with toileting.
• Hospice: People who are expected to live six months or less can receive health care and social services from hospice services. These services also provide counseling for family members.
• In-home Nurses: A nurse can provide a wide variety of services. Examples include performing physical assessments, drawing blood, providing wound care, and administering intravenous medication.
• In-Home Therapists: These professionals may help with variety of care to improve your condition and include physical, speech, and occupational therapy.
• Adult day services: Older people get supervision, socialization, recreation, meals and some health care and counseling from providers, which can include senior centers nursing homes or assisted living facilities.

• Caregiver support groups: These groups provide emotional support and information sharing among people who are caregivers.
• Geriatric case managers: These professionals can assess your parents' situation, connect them with appropriate services, and oversee the care they receive on an ongoing basis
• Respite care: These services provide care to relieve family caregivers. Care can be provided for a few hours a day to several weeks. The care can be in an adult day center, a nursing home, in the home or elsewhere.
• Parish Nurse Program: Check with your faith community to see if your church has a parish nurse program. If so, these nurses can be very helpful to assist you in many ways. People from your congregation may be able to help you in many ways. The parish nurses usually have a lot of information on help that exists in the community. They are there to help you in this regard.

• Identify all your needs for help: You may be able to do this easily yourself, working with your parent. Or, you may want to have a case manager conduct a formal assessment, which will identify both needs and sources of assistance.
• Do research to find out what community services are available where you or your parent lives.
• Compare costs and find out what insurance will cover. While you may be able to find free or subsidized services, some of these may be offered only on a short-term basis. If Medicare or Medicaid, or other insurance provides coverage, find out the limits.
• Check for the quality of services: Get referrals from friends and family. Interview providers personally and involve your parent if feasible. Find out about education, training and experience and get at least two references. Find out if any agency screens and bonds employees and provides training. Visit facilities such as adult day care centers to check for how clean they are, what kinds of activities are going on and the types of people participating.
• Be organized: Specialists on aging suggest developing a file system for all the agencies or services you research. Information you lean now may be useful later.

Types of Services Home Care Providers Deliver:

Registered Nurses (RNs) and licensed practiced nurses (LPNs): Provide skilled services that cannot be performed safely and effectively by nonprofessional personnel. Some of these services include injections and intravenous therapy, wound care, education on disease treatment and prevention, and patient assessments. RNs may also provide case management services. RNs have received 2-4 years (sometimes more) of specialized education and are licensed to practice by the state. LPNs have 1-2 years of specialized training and are licensed to work under the supervision of registered nurses. The intricacy of a patient's medical condition and required course of treatment determine whether care should be provided by an RN or can provide by an LPN.

Physical Therapists (PTs): Work to restore the mobility and strength of patients who are limited or disabled by physical injuries or illness through the used of exercise, massage, and other methods. Physical Therapists often alleviate pain and restore injured muscles with specialized equipment. They also teach patients and caregivers special techniques for walking and transfer.

Social Workers: Evaluate the social and emotional factors affecting ill and disabled individuals and provide counseling. They also help patients and their family members identify available community resources.

Speech Language Pathologists: Work to develop and restore the speech of individuals with communication disorders; usually these disorders are the result of trauma, surgery, or stroke. Speech therapists also help retrain patients in breathing, swallowing, and muscle control.

Occupational Therapists (OTs): Help individuals who have physical, developmental, social, or emotional problems that prevent them from performing the general activities of daily living (ADLs). Occupational Therapists instruct patients on using specialized rehabilitation techniques and equipment to improve their function in tasks such as eating, bathing, dressing, and basic household routines.

Dieticians: Provide counseling services to individuals who need professional dietary assessment and teaching to properly manage an illness or disability through proper diet.

Home Care Aides/Home Health Aides: Assist patients with ADLs such as getting in and out of bed, walking, bathing, toileting, and dressing. Some aides have received special training and are qualified to provide more complex services under the supervision of a nursing professional.

Homemakers: Perform light household duties such as laundry, meal preparation, general housekeeping, and shopping. Their services are directed at maintaining patient households rather than providing hands-on assistance with personal care.

Companions: Provide comfort to individuals who, for medical and/or safety reasons, may not be left at home alone or who desire companionship for social and emotional reasons. Some companions may assist clients with household tasks, but most are limited to providing sitter services.