–Please note, this is the second installment of a two-part series. To read the first post, click here—
Caring for a loved one is tough, but caring for a loved one that lives a distance away from you can seem impossible. And while it is certainly a huge challenge, there are still things that you can do to help care for a loved one that is a considerable distance away from you.
In my last blog, I talked about using technology to keep in touch and to do so with regular consistency. This is a good start, but having eyes on your loved one in person is also important. If you have people that live near your loved one, have them check in for you once in a while and gauge their opinions.
This is all a good start for evaluating whether further action is needed. But it is only a start.
Establish your team. That could involve those that live nearby, both friends and family. It should also include professionals, too. Those professionals might be caregivers or home health aides, but they don’t necessarily need to be. There are other professionals out there that can assess needs. The important thing is that you have a team that you can rely on to help out.
You also need to stay in touch with that team regularly–just like you would stay in touch with your loved one themselves. Communication is essential for success when it comes to high quality care. When that care is administered at a distance, communication becomes even more vital since you are not seeing things firsthand.
Having safeguards in place is also a must. If your loved one was receiving subpar care and they lived in the same home as you, you would know that this was the case in a very short amount of time. Getting this setup might be a challenge, but it’s essential if you want to ensure that the care being given is the best that it can be. Speaking with an ombudsman local to your loved one will give you a more clear direction of how to get this safeguard put in place.
Caring for a loved one from a distance is tough. Working with a professional caregiver can help, though. Even if that caregiver is remote, too, they can still work alongside your loved one, providing the support and assistance that is needed. It might not be quite the same as providing that care yourself, but it is a helpful solution–especially when you go through a reputable care service. This can take some time to establish, but when you have it set up it is one of the best ways that you can help your loved ones.
We’d love to help from our end, if possible. Please feel free to get in touch with us to set up a free consultation session and start the conversation today. One of our caregivers would be happy to walk you through what in-home care could do for your family–even if you are far away from them.
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