Just looking at statistics often doesn’t help us to put together the big picture when it comes to how senior care will impact families. And there are a lot of statistics out there. For example, you’ve probably heard that about 52 percent of people age 65 or older will need long term care during their lives. That’s more than half, which implies that at least one of your parents will need senior care in the future. That’s a staggering statistic, but it also is lacking in any sort of humanity. Unfortunately, that’s how most statistics are. They are a numerical representation of real life occurrences, and the numbers can be tossed around while dehumanizing the people and the situations that they are meant to represent.
Or what about this statistic: the average lifetime cost of senior care for an American is $138,000. That stat seems to hold a lot of information at first glance. But what it leaves out is that the average cost for women is much higher: $182,000. It’s likely going to cost more to find care for your mother than it is for your father, simply because women have longer life expectancies.
The bottom line is that statistics mean very little for individuals. Even when you break the population up into men and women, stats start to lose their meaning. Rather than focus on generalizations and statistics that don’t really apply to your situation, you need to take an individualized approach to your family’s care. They are not numbers, but real living people. And they are people that you love. Statistics can be helpful for politicians and those that make decisions regarding care, but they don’t help you much when you have a family member in need.
For example, do statistics mean anything to you if someone you love develops Alzheimer’s disease? No! It doesn’t matter that this only impacts a certain number of seniors each year, and it doesn’t matter what helps most people with Alzheimer’s. You and your family are impacted by this now, and you need to ensure that the care that your loved one receive is customized and what’s best for them and their specific situation, not what helps others. It can be educational to know those things, and they may serve as a good starting point, but they might not apply to your specific situation at this time.
Because care needs to be individualized for it to help people most effectively, you will find that what works for one family might not work for your family. You might need a personalized in-home care service to assist your dad, while someone down the street has their mother in a nursing home. You might be paying for your grandma’s care out of pocket, while someone else uses Medi-Cal to offset costs. Both of these are perfectly fine choices, as long as the care and the circumstances around the care are helpful for your family to stay as healthy and happy as you can be.
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