Cathy Cress

Expert in Aging Life and Geriatric Care Management

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Emergency Go Binder -Family Caregivers Need for Global Warming

August 16, 2023

What Senior Services Can Do in Disasters

What Senior Services can do in disasters – You can prepare an emergency plan for your own agency. This is critical now for all care managers, home care agencies, and any senior service because of global warming. With the Maui Fire, CSA, or any senior agency watching another global climate change disaster, happening right in Maui. Senior service providers need to know how to prepare elders and their agencies for fires. Many of those suspected dead in Lahaina are thought to be older people who could not escape quickly enough as it was a fire that was swept by Hurricane Dora’s 80-mile-an-hour winds spread the fire so fast that many many just could not escape and now suspected snapped power lines . Lionel Montalvo, retired fire chief in Lahaina, said that many dead elderly would be found  Fema puts out a handout that can be shared with elders about how to prepare for fires with their level of disability.

In An Emergency, I  Panicked

What Senior Services can do in disasters was vividly revealed to me. I live in Santa Cruz County, Ca. , where the disaster of a 6.9 earthquake, in 1989 happened and future earthquakes stalk us. But we had a double disaster in  Aug 2021. Covid had started and then one of the 30 fires begun by lightning strikes all over California set the Santa Cruz mountains, with ancient 3000-year-old redwoods, ablaze. The fires caused 70,000 evacuations, and flames destroyed 1,490 structures, as the firefighters did not have enough fire personnel to fight the fire. There were so many fires statewide that all firefighters in the state were not enough to fight the blazes. In addition to the horror, the fast-spreading fire, our three assigned planes to drop water on the inferno, could not fly as smoke and fog prevented it. They went to other California fires.

I Had No Grab and GO, Binder

When all this was announced by emergency alerts we were told to prepare to evacuate too. In spite of just teaching how to put together a go binder for COVID- I had no go binder myself. I had no list of what I would take in an emergency from a 5 bedroom house with multiple family heirlooms, original art by children, grandchildren, and now famous friends, I had never scanned the multiple photographs of our family in frames to GOOGLE PHOTOS  all over the house nor those critical important documents like our trust, birth certificates, passports, insurance info in a filing to add a go binder. I  never made a GO Binder. I did that later now when the fire is 30% contained when it was no help in the emergency, but I do now when worldwide global emergencies, world wide spread like the black death.

What to put in Go-Binder

Emergency plan

What Senior Services can do in disasters is help clients create a grab-and-go binder with all the emergency contacts, documents like advanced directives, DNR power of attorney, and family contacts, the family cannot physically go into the hospital or evacuate but this Go binder can take your place. With important information about your family member when they are admitted without you by their side. Your go-binder should contain your family members’ most important information and documents. This will include.

  • Medical information
  • Emergency Contact List
  • Advanced Directives 
  • Critical medical, insurance, social security, Trust/will docs 
  • You can also order them pre-prepared 

Prepare for Double Disasters Now

In emergency situations, people sometimes do not think rationally as I did in the Santa Cruz mountain fire. We never know how we are going to react in an emergency until it actually happens. In order to prepare for any situation, hurricanes & COVID, Fires creating a grab-and-go binder should be an important part of your shelter-in-place plan for aging friends or relatives.

If Covid returns with new variants and many anti-vaxers who refuse immunizations,  older people sheltering in place, can still contract COVID and be rushed to the hospital in an emergency. But on top of COVID other emergencies like storms, wildfires, and floods occur on the top of the pandemic. Think of this summer and fall  when the hurricane season is predicted to be catastrophic due to climate change, the warming of the Oceans, and in the last week Hurricane Dora creating, along with drought the brutal disaster on going in Maui, where 1000 people are still missing and the dead over 100.

EMERGENCY PLAN FOR EVERY DISASTER

Prepare for emergencies

Emergency Plan Needed for all Senior Service Agencies to Serve Clients in the Misdst of Disasters and Exploding Global Climate Change 

What Senior Services must do in disasters, especially exploding climate change events, is to create an emergency plan for all emergencies for all staff, caregivers, and aging clients in your senior agencies or you as a practitioner. With hurricane Dora causing the  Maui fire and the west once again facing massive wildfires, tornados already wreaking devastation this season and the polar vortex perhaps coming again next year-do you have emergency procedures?

The emergency plan to prepare for emergencies should contain specific policies and procedures,  like who will care for your clients when the agency members have to evacuate, and a plan that is written out and made explicitly. It should include directions that the owner or manager would like followed in emergency circumstances. The emergency plan should be signed and dated by both the owner and the manager, reviewed periodically, and updated as policies and procedures or circumstances change. An emergency plan is your first line of defense when an emergency or disaster occurs.

Informal agency emergency procedures work in a start-up care management business but what if the solo practitioner is ill and out?

If illness, accident, or some other unforeseen event overtakes an owner or man­ager, like, no emergency procedures can be suicide in an emergency, not to mention liabil­ity to your elderly clients.

You could be like  GCM Jim Boyd who lost his business in the Paradise Fire that knocked him out.

PARADISE FIRE DEVASTATION OF A GERIATRIC CARE MANAGEMENT PRACTICE

GCM Jim Boyd of Paradise, California lost everything in the catastrophic fire in the town of Paradise, where he lived and practiced. He was trying to evacuate aging clients in Paradise, located in the midst of the Sierra forest when the huge forest fire immolated the entire town. Another care manager in the Sierras took over for him as an Aging Life Care partner. Although a “Go Fund Me” started by the Aging Life Care Association raised almost $10,000 for Jim, he did not have enough to rebuild his Paradise home where he had his home-based GCM business. Then he and  90% of the residents of Paradise never returned.

Emergency Plan-Every geriatric care professional needs a formal, written backup plan that dictates action, should a disaster or emergency arise.

 

It‘s necessary to assess your company’s risk of temporary or permanent service disrup­tion  you will prepare for emergencies with an agency emergency plan

if a disaster or emergency is experienced. This may seem an overwhelming task at first, but when you break it down into pieces, it becomes workable.

One part of your emergency plan should be explaining an emergency plan and checking the home for safety at intake. Then at each monitoring visit have an emergency plan checklist to make sure safety devices work- and are still in the house –are their batteries that still work, flashlights fire alarms, if an emergency exit plan is still posted, and family or paid caregivers still trained on what to do in an emergency.

Learn how to prepare for emergencies and how you can prepare yourself, your clients, and your staff for disasters and absences of key personnel.

With global warming’s effects causing fires like the Maui Fire -floods, larger hurricanes, and the specter of more catastrophic weather events, you need to prepare for emergencies. Get the new Handbook of Geriatric Care Management 4th edition now at my website –  out in Kindle or hardback with an excellent chapter on how to prepare your agency for disasters, plus forms to use, by former GCM President Liz Barlow.           

 

 

 

Filed Under: Advanced Directives and Covid-19, advanced directives& COVID-19, Aging, aging family crisis, Aging Life Care, aging life care manager, ALCA COVID-19 Crisis, ALCA Disaster Plan, ALCA Products for COVID_19, Blog, Coronavirus Coaching, Coronavirus emergency plan, Coronavirus safety elders, coronavirus shut down, CORONAVIRUS Stay at Home Plan, COVID, COVID-19 & Care Management, COVID-19 & Wildfire, COVID-19 &Shelter in Place Plan, Covid-19 and GCM SERVICES, COVID-19 Emergency Go Binder, COVID-19 Emergency Plan, Covid-19 GCM Products, COVID-19 Hospital Discharge Plan, COVID-19 Plus Hurricane, COVID-19 Recover at Home Plan, elder care manager, Emergency Go Binder, Emergency Plan, Geriatric Care Manager, geriatric social worker, nurse advocate, nurse care manager Tagged With: 5th edition GCM OPERATIONS MANUAL, ADVANCED DIRECTIVES & COVID-19, aging parent crisis, care manager, case manager, COVID GCM Procedures, COVID- 19 GO Binder, COVID-19 PRODUCTS, Covid-19 Telehealth, COVID-19& LONG DISTANCE CARE, crisis with aging parents, geriatric care manager, nurse advocate, nurse care manager, parent care crisis

Dysfunctional Families Facing Death Wreak Havoc at End of Life

August 3, 2023

What do Dysfunctional Families do at the End of Life?

 

Dysfunctional families facing death and dying have flawed fractured family conversations. Often they do not communicate at all or engage in destructive accusations lobbed at others. They see one another as enemies. They demonize one another!

Dysfunctional families facing death are feuding families, escalating the pain of death to a chaotic war room. They blame each other instead of locking arms in a crisis.

Dysfunctional families facing death sabotage resolution.

Facing Fractured Family Communication

What are some of the struggles that these aging dysfunctional families facing death with fractured family communication can face?

Aging parents who lack the capacity to make decisions have no advance directives, DPOA 

health-care proxy, and adult siblings, who must make end-of-life decisions, can’t agree

Withdrawal of life support with no designated health care agent then dysfunctional families facing death the adult children and/or spouse disagree

Pain management  Dysfunctiona families facing death adult children and/or spouses disagree.

Answer to Fractured Family at End of Life – Mediation.

Dysfunctional families facing death

 

Mediation is a tool that fractured families can be a good resource for dysfunctional families at the end of life. It can help with these difficult families facing the death of a parent without fracturing the entire family. It can allow an older person to die without pain inflicted by their own aging dysfunctional families.

SIGN UP FOR NEW FREE WEBINAR

Understand the Dysfunctional Aging Family System you must enter to get care for elders in aging dysfunctional families
Understand 11 Warning Signs You Are Working with Dysfunctional Family

Master 10 Clinical Tools Professionals Must learn before they work with These Difficult Families
Learn how to solve dysfunctional family problems like End of Life family chaos after you master these tools  for aging dysfunctional families
Get care for aging family members when the dysfunctional family members resist
Learn how to work with characters like Rupert Murdock & Logan Roy

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 Find out more in the YouTube for My YouTube, Channel  Geriatric Care 1

 

 

 

Filed Under: Advanced Directives, Advanced Directives and Covid-19, Aging, aging life care manager, Benefits of ALCA to Hospice, Death and Dying, Death and Dying Care Management, Dysfunctional aging family, Dysfunctional Family Mediation, End of Life, End of Life Care manager, End of life documents, estranged elder parents and adult kids, estranged siblings, Families, FREE WEBINAR, GCM COACHING SKILLS, Geriatric Care Management Business, Geriatric Care Manager, geriatric social worker, Good Death, Hospice Care, mediation, Mediation End of Life, nurse advocate, nurse care manager Tagged With: adult sibling, aging family, aging parent care, aging parent crisis, black american geriatric care managers, black american social workers, Black Entrepreneurs, Black geriatric care managers, Black Nurse Entrepreneurs, Black RN's, Black start-up geriatric care management, care planning, caregiver burnout, conservator, death, dysfunctional aging family, dysfunctional family, dysfunctional siblings, dysfuntional family, elder care crisis, end of life, end of life family meeting, estranged siblings, families fretting at end of life, free webinar, geraitric assessment, geriatric care management, geriatric care manager, geriatric care managers, mediation, mediator, My Geriatric Care Management Operations Manual, no advanced directive, no DPOA, no health care proxy, withdraw of life support

What Does a Care Manager Do Before End of Life Diagnosis?

November 29, 2022

End of Life has 5 Phases   

   

 

Before the end-of-life diagnosis, the ALCA or GCM care manager helps clients be active participants in their care and gives the family caregiver the tools to manage the care.            

The geriatric care manager serves older adults before they find they are dying. GCMs work with chronic care clients, sometimes for years, who eventually succumb to their illness. But they also work with clients who come to them facing the end of life issues.

 The process of acceptance and adjustment to terminal illness has five phases:

 

before the diagnosis,             

 

  • the acute phase ­

 

  • the chronic phase

 

  • the recovery phase

 

  • the terminal phase 
  • Geriatric Care Managers’ Tasks Before the diagnosis

  • Schedule medical  appts
  • Help family ask questions  of medical professionals
  • Before visiting  the client maintain an updated medication list and a list of any drug allergies
  • Assist the family in organizing all  Advanced care planning documents documents

  • Go to medical appointments with the client or train family members make a list of questions and have ready
  • Set up personal health records.       
  • Assist family members in setting up and use of a calendar to keep a log of important medication information, questions, and things out of the ordinary that happens to the ill person
  •  
  •  
  • Join me Tuesday, January 24, and learn why End of Life Services Are a perfect new service for care managers 

  • Deliver a Good End of Life- Add Death and Dying to Your Care Management Agency

  •  

     

     

    Serve Your Client Until Death Do You Part

     In this 1 ½ -hour webinar you will learn how to

     1. Transition the patient/family through the five stages of death

  •  2. Help clients be active participants in their care               

    3. Give the family/caregiver tools to manage care

    4. Provide family center care to caregivers and family

    5. Choose the right support services through all stages of death

    6. Introduce Hospice and Palliative care and work with their team

    7. Use ALCA End-of-Life Benefits During COVID

    8.Use  COVID -19  Family Coaching for GCM

  • Sign -Up 

  • Free Webinar

     

     

    If you really want to add End of Life to your care management business sign up for this webinar now

Filed Under: 5 stages of death, 5 Stages of Dying, 5 stages of End of Life, Advanced Directives, Advanced Directives and Covid-19, Aging, Aging Life Care, aging life care manager, Atul Gawande, black care manager, black concieirge nurse, black concierge care manager, black concierge RN, Black Entrepreneur, Black Entrepreneur RB, Black entrepreneurs, Black Geriatric Care Manager, Black geriatric care managers, Black RN, black RN care manager, black social worker, black travel nurse, Black Travel Nurses, Black Travel RN, Blog, care management business, Death & Dying, Death and Dying, Death and Dying Care Management, death and dying care manager, End of Life, End of life documents, Families, FREE WEBINAR, GCM working with end of life, GCM workinh with hospice, Geriatric Care Management Business, Geriatric Care Manager, geriatric social worker, Good end of life, Good hospice, Hospice, nurse advocate, nurse care manager, Palliative Care, Quality of Life in Dying Tagged With: 5 stages of death, adding end of life services, aging family, aging life care manager, aging parent crisis, ALCA in End Of Life, care manager, case manager, Elizabeth kubla Ross, end of life care manager, End of Life Diagnosis, GCM Family Coaching end of life, GCM in Death and Dying, geriatric care manager, Hospice at end of life, Navigation through END of LIfe, nurse advocate, nurse care manager, Tools to manage end of life, webinar end of life

11 Parts of Care Manager’s Role With Family Death and Dying of COVID-19?

February 4, 2021

 

GCM Role is Working With Family In COVID-19

Care managers cannot be in the hospital with a  patient dying of COVID-19. They can support their bereft adult children, who cannot see their parents during the hospitalization, in those last moments of goodbye’s or after the death in this deadly pandemic.

In normal times care managers play a big role in end of life issues. They are their navigators through all five stages of dying, many times long before palliative care or hospice are called. Often GCM’s can help the family and client to bring in hospice or palliative care. But is COVID -19 they can offer guidance to the family through the sometimes weeks of hospitalization, intubation, their loved one is on a ventilator and ultimately often- death separated from loved ones.

Navigation Through a COVID-19 Death

 The normal final passage through life can emotionally charged.  If the family is following a long labyrinth to the end, in coronavirus, the blind alleys may be blocked by a rushed hospitalization, banned from seeing their loved one in the hospital, and not understanding the disease that is killing their loved one.

Care managers can find an opening through this maze.  Family dynamics and fear of dying can all explode a fraught crisis of care in dying of coronavirus. When vital end-of-life decisions need to be made, the stress of the responsibility and the seriousness of the situation can break into a mammoth wave of distress fear, and anxiety over the “ whole family system”. The geriatric care manager specializes in solving these end of life decisions for whole family system even at the end of life.

Facilitate Family talks over hospitalized COVID-19 Elder

Care Managers can facilitate terrified discussions outside the hospital, and clear the way for family members to come together to work as a functional unit around an unknown killer disease that preys on their loved one. Understanding the differing viewpoints is critical.  Knowing what a parent wants and does not want during the last days and hours of life help define and simplify the role of the family.  It helps the family bear the burden of having the responsibility of making decisions that their parent wants. Turning this around can also help families have some solace that they carried out their parent’s wishes after their parent’s death. 

 

Care managers can help family members handle the stress of an elder’s hospitalization and death by:

  • Encouraging routines, exercise, and social connectedness with friends and family
  • Advocate for them with the hospital staff to get updates in this chaotic time in hospitals
  • Help them maintain contact with the” hospital quarterback “ to get updated medical status and give input
  • Find technology for the family to communicate with the hospitalized family member  via text, telephone, email, or video chat
  • Support and mediate if necessary proactive discussions and advanced directive preparation in a rush if not done
  • Build a circle of care can help to reduce some of the potential conflicts,
  • Support them in having essential conversations, prior to needing  intubation, on last wishes if health status deteriorates  
  • Provide opportunities to say goodbye via technology
  • guide them in setting up rituals that can celebrate the end of life and give solace to a family during a time when there are yet no rituals for a COVID-19 death.
  • Work with the hospital to set up Zoom with the family to say goodbye to a loved one. 
  • Geriatric care managers do much more with clients and families but especially now with Covid-19 elder’s and their families facing a  separated, fractious end of life
  • Deliver a Good End of Life- Add Death and Dying to Your Care Management Agency

     

    Join me Thursday March 11 and learn why End of Life Services Are a perfect new service for care managers

     Sign Up   

    In this 1 ½ -hour webinar you will learn how to

     

    1.Transition the patient/family through the five stages of death

  • 2.Help clients be active participants in their care3.Give the family/caregiver tools to manage care

    4. Provide family center care to caregiver and family

    5 Choose the right support services through all stages of death

    6.Introduce Hospice and Palliative care and work with their team

    7. Use ALCA End of Life Benefits During COVID

    8.Use  COVID -19  Family Coaching for GCM

    Sign Up 

    If you really want to add End of Life to your care management business sign up for this webinar now

     

     See more about Cathy and her book Care Manager’s Working With The Aging Family

  • DyingGriefandBurial in the AgingFamily

Filed Under: Advanced Directives and Covid-19, Aging, Aging Community & Covid-19, Aging Life Care, aging life care manager, ALCA COVID-19 Crisis, ALCA Role Death and Dying, Blog, care manager, case manager, CIRCLE OF CARE, coronavirus, Coronavirus emergency plan, coronavirus shut down, Covid 19, COVID-19 & Care Management, Covid-19 Death, Death and Dying, Death and Dying Care Management, death and dying care manager, elder care manager, End of Life, Families, FREE WEBINAR, GCM role Death and Dying, GCM Working With Aging Family, Geriatric Care Management Business, geriatric care manager, Geriatric Care Manager, geriatric social worker, Good Death, nurse care manager, Therapist Specializing in Aging Tagged With: adding end of life services, aging life and geraitric care manager, death and dying, death and dying in COVID-19, Death and Dying in hospital, end of life care manager, geriatric care manager, Hospice at end of life, Hospice Care, hospice for elderly parent, Navigation through END of LIfe, Palliative Care at end of life, Technolog COVID-19 in Hospital, Tools to manage end of life

Offering a COVID care plan product for Long Distance Care Providers

July 27, 2020

 

 

 

Initial Intake

The first step for the Long-distance family members (LDF) worried about elder exposure and hospitalization is an initial consultation and intake with the client and LDF.  This consult will identify the current status of the senior in the home environment.  This care management consultation can be done with a HIPAA-compliant video conferencing service

 

  • Required Legal Documents Family Long Distance Family Needs

     

  • – The first thing that the geriatric care manager works on is to find out if the older person has the required legal documents – Advanced directives, POA/HCPOA & GCM HIPAA  release because of the risk of both hospitalization and death due to age-related COVID-19. If these documents are not present, have a discussion with senior/LDF regarding their wishes, explaining that older adults over 65 are at higher risk for severe illness. The care manager will discuss who is to be the health care decision-maker and consult a family attorney or elder law attorney to complete.  If they choose not to use an elder law attorney, as time is of the essence in the pandemic, they can suggest accessing AARP advanced directives documents for any state which can be executed quickly.
  • G0-Binder

  •  If documents are completed, locate in-home and provide explanations to the family that they must give a copy to emergency contacts and physicians as required and place in planning binder.  In the planning “Go binder” list all emergency contacts with phone numbers/e-mail addresses – family, friends, physicians, pharmacy, professionals providing in-home services.  Also, list all medications and prescribing physicians in “Go Binder”.  Upload documents into caregiving applications like caringvillage.com so the long-distance family always has the updated documents.

JOIN ME FOR MY NEW FREE WEBINAR 

Create 5 Telehealth Products for COVID 19

WHEN. THURSDAY AUGUST 6

TIME- 2 PM Pacific Standard Time

Care Management businesses are struggling with pandemic close-downs.

Support your business bottom line, clients, and their families.

Create 5 COVID products

Products from sheltering in place through the hospital, recovery at home, discharge from an SNF, or hospital for local and long-distance elders. Increase your bottom

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Learn Step by Step How to Consult with Aging Families and Seniors

Choose the best Hipaa Compliant Telehealth Products to Remotely Consult with Client

  • Help a Local Family Help a Loved One Safely Shelter in Place
  • Help a Long-Distance Family Help a Local Loved One Shelter in Place

  • Help an Aging Family Help a Loved on Hospitalized for Covid-19
  • Help an Aging Family Help a Loved one Recover when Discharged from a

Nursing Home

  • Help an Aging Family Help a loved one Recover when Discharged from a

Hospital

WHEN. THURSDAY AUGUST 6

 

TIME- 2 PM Pacific Standard Time

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Filed Under: Advanced Directives and Covid-19, Aging, Aging Community & Covid-19, Aging Life Care, aging life care manager, Aging therapist, ALCA & Skilled Nursing Facility, ALCA COVID-19 Crisis, ALCA Products for COVID_19, Blog, Covid 19 Webinar, COVID-19 & Care Management, COVID-19 Webinar, GCM COVID 19 Crisis, GCM products in COVID-19, Geriatric Care Management Business, Geriatric Care Manager, geriatric social worker, Intake COVID-19, Long Distance Care & COVID-19, nurse advocate, nurse care manager, Telehealth COVID-19products Tagged With: ADVANCED DIRECTIVES & COVID-19, aging family, aging life and geraitric care manager, aging life care manager, aging parent crisis, care manager, case manager, coronavirus and seniors, Coronavirus disaster plan, COVID_19 inquiry, Covid-19, COVID-19 Webinar, COVID-19& LONG DISTANCE CARE, geriatric care manager, nurse advocate, nurse care manager, Webinar

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