senior diet - mesa live in care

Is It Time to Reconsider What Your Parents Have for Dinner?

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A healthy senior diet is recommended for many reasons. It’s the best way to lose weight, keep blood pressure and cholesterol levels in the normal range, and even is believed to help prevent Alzheimer’s. If your parents don’t like to cook for themselves, a healthy diet may be hard to maintain.

Do you know what a senior’s diet should include and avoid? With age come changes to what and how much to eat. Here are the current recommendations…

Double Up on Vegetables

Some seniors do not eat enough when it comes to fresh fruits and vegetables. Your parent’s dinner plate should have fruits and vegetables on half the plate, a lean protein on one quarter, and a whole grain option on the remaining quarter.

Vegetables are important as they’re great sources of antioxidants. Cruciforms like Brussels sprouts and broccoli are a good choice for their cancer-prevention qualities. See if your parents would consider swapping out two or three meals a week for vegetarian meals to limit the amount of meat they eat.

If your mom or dad can’t chop vegetables, invest in a food processor. It can make it easy to prep ingredients when arthritis makes it hard to hold a knife. Or, hire a home care professional for meal preparation.

Get Plenty of Calcium

Calcium is a good way to prevent osteoporosis. Fat-free or low-fat dairy options are ideal. Plain low-fat yogurt is a good choice if your mom or dad hates drinking milk. You can add it to fruit smoothies each morning to mask the taste if that’s an issue.

If your parents cannot digest or stomach dairy items, look for cereals and fruit juices that are fortified with vitamin D and calcium. Orange juice is one option that often comes in a calcium-added version.

Lower Saturated Fat, Sodium, and Sugar Intake

Saturated fat, sodium, and sugar are to be avoided. All three can increase the risk of health issues like high blood pressure, heart disease, and diabetes. While frozen meals and canned soups are easy, they’re often loaded with all three. Cooking meals from scratch is ideal.

Your parents need to get used to reading labels. They may need magnifiers when shopping for items. Many pasta sauces add sugar or corn syrup to the tomatoes to add sweetness. Sugar is often found in canned soups, packaged bread, deli meats, fruit juices, and yogurts.

If your parents don’t like to cook, they can avoid takeout and packaged meals. Call a home care agency and ask about caregivers. Caregivers provide companionship, but they’ll also cook meals, shop for food and much more to help loved ones maintain a healthy senior diet.

If you or an aging loved-one needs care, please contact the Mesa live-in care experts at Endeavor Home Care today at 480-498-2324.

Elderly Care in Mesa AZ: Finding the Best Doctor

Finding the Best Doctor for Your Mom’s Changing Health Needs

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As your mom gets older, her medical needs may change. At one point, her visits to the doctor would have been geared toward OB/GYN care and yearly medical exams. Now, she needs to have her bone density checked. She might need memory care visits or help with proper nutrition as she ages. She could be moving to be closer to you and needs a doctor nearby.

If your mom has outgrown her doctor or needs one in a new location, she’s not alone. Moving her to another doctor who specializes in elder care is a big change, but it can be a beneficial change. If you need to make a change, here are some ways to make the transition go smoothly.

 

Read Reviews

Look online for reviews. You can get a feel for a doctor’s personality and skill. Remember that people may emphasize the bad. See if there are follow-up reviews to get a full picture.

Look for patterns. If you find a doctor has dozens of reviews saying there are billing errors, it’s likely that’s true. If there are dozens of reviews calling the doctor friendly and approachable and one that says the doctor is standoffish, it’s more likely that the friendly and approachable aspect is true.

Read reviews in several spots. Google, Yelp, Facebook, and Healthgrades are all places to start. Look specifically for verified reviews that prove the reviewer really did see that doctor.

 

Ask for Referrals

If your mom likes her doctor, ask that doctor for a referral. The doctor may not specialize in geriatric care but knows someone who. Ask friends and family members for suggestions, too. When you have suggestions, start reading reviews.

 

Look at Office Hours

There’s a doctor in the right area who gets great reviews. You look at the office hours and the doctor is only at that location until noon. That might not be convenient if you’re the person who drives your mom to appointments and works during the week.

 

Schedule an Introductory Meeting

Schedule a meeting to meet the new doctor. Your mom can ask questions and make sure she likes the new doctor. If there is a personality clash, it’s better to know before you schedule a full medical exam.

With a doctor you and your mom can trust, a caregiver can cover the aspect of socialization when aging at home. Elder care services like companionship and transportation ensure your mom is able to spend time with other seniors and with someone each day at home.

If you or an aging loved-one are considering hiring elderly care in Mesa or the surrounding area, please contact the caring staff at Endeavor Home Care today. Call  (480) 535-6800.

Elderly Care in Mesa AZ: Parent Cataracts Risks

Can You Protect Your Parent from Cataracts?

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June is Cataract Awareness Month.

As a family caregiver, this is an ideal opportunity for you to take steps to help reduce the risk your parent will suffer from cataracts. While there is no sure way to completely prevent the development of cataracts, taking certain steps can reduce the risk, and can even slow the development of them.

 

Some ways you can help to protect your aging parent’s vision by reducing the risk of cataracts include:

● Encourage your aging parent to visit their eye doctor regularly. Regular visits allow a doctor to monitor your parent’s eye health and detect changes that could indicate the earliest stages of cataracts. This enables them to recommend a treatment and management approach that is right for your senior parent.

● If your parents smoke, encourage them to stop. Smoking increases the pressure within the eye and is shown to increase the risk of developing cataracts as well as other eye health issues. Talk to the doctor about safe and effective ways they can quit smoking.

● Work with your parent to make sure they are managing their other health problems effectively. If they are suffering from diabetes or high blood pressure, for example, their risk for developing cataracts is increased. Not managing these health issues effectively further increases this risk, and can also put them at greater risk of more serious consequences. the personalized services of an elderly care provider can be instrumental in assisting at your parent with proper management of their health issues.

● Make sure your parent wears sunglasses anytime they will be exposed to the sun. Look for sunglasses with broad-spectrum protection from UVA and UVB rays. Glasses that curve around the sides of the eyes and the feature of large lenses are most effective at blocking rays that may come from an angle or above.

● Encourage your aging parent to eat a healthy, balanced diet rich in fruits and vegetables. The antioxidants contained within these foods can protect eye health and reduce the risk of problems such as cataracts.

The low vision that can result from cataracts and other eye health problems can make a dramatic difference in your parents quality of life, health, and safety.

Fortunately, starting elderly care for them can be a highly effective and meaningful way to help your parent cope with these issues. An elderly home care services provider can be in the home with your senior on a customized schedule to provide highly personalized services designed to help your parent cope with diminished vision while still maintaining as much independence and activity as possible. Services such as physical support and assistance, help with personal care tasks and housekeeping tasks, and support in making good lifestyle choices can help your parent to stay safer and healthier even as they cope with eye health problems and vision limitations.

 

If you or an aging loved-one are considering Elderly Care in Mesa, AZ, please contact the caring staff at Endeavor Home Care today. Call  (480) 535-6800.

Sources:

https://www.mayoclinic.org/

https://lasik.ucla.edu