Cathy Cress

Expert in Aging Life and Geriatric Care Management

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How Storytelling at Thanksgiving Can Give Elders A Happier Family Holiday

November 20, 2023

Want to increase aging parents’ and everyone’s enjoyment at Thanksgiving? Try storytelling at Thanksgiving using elders’ memories.

As an aging professional, you can bring joy to an older person  through reminiscence, storytelling, and oral history for elders

This Thanksgiving, if you really do travel to a family home or grandma’s house, travel safely  If not make the safest choice, stay home and  use Zoom and include your elderly

 

parent. You can do oral history for elders if they can use a computer or have a family member or friend who visits often and who lives nearby and is in their bubble serve and share Thanksgiving dinner at their home and use zoom with them to see other family members on the holiday.

Share Your Thanksgiving Story

If you are at a family member’s holiday dinner and use reminiscence for elders by asking everyone to tell their favorite story about a Thanksgiving dinner. Start with midlife members to get the idea and then ask

 

again parents to share their stories.

Oral history for elders will bring extra thanks to Thanksgiving by learning about an elder’s past and giving them the opportunity to share, which sometimes they do not do in the hubbub of family talking.

  The “telling ” also means someone documents. That magically gives the elder and a child social interaction and connectedness. Elders vividly recall their past by telling stories from vignettes in their life – especially life in their 20’s, which sparks the richest recall called the “20’s bump”, according to researchers.

Elders sharing stories means passing on history.

So try storytelling at  Thanksgiving, and it becomes intergenerational. The older person is given a chance to give the larger picture of their life and family history to children and grandchildren or extended family, who may not have heard all the details of their grandparents’ or parents’ lives before. My 10 grandchildren have grown up with their now 80-year-old grandfather. telling them exciting stories of when he was a California Highway patrolman. So a dual dose of a higher quality of life for the older person and the aging family is increased through oral history and reminiscence.

Capture Your Families Past Before It Is Gone

 

 Many midlife adults now do ancestry and regret not asking older family members questions when they were alive. Capture that past now on this family holiday. An aging professional or a geriatric care manager can suggest family or friends record the Thanksgiving story as oral history using technology like an i Phone or i Pad.

Story Telling at Thanksgiving  with Story Worth

Another great idea to capture reminiscence for elders is giving them StoryWorth. 

 

My daughter sent this gift to her Dad  and me; he and I love it. Each week  StoryWorth sends a question to my husband that prompts him to write about his past. He writes his reminiscence out longhand and I easily use the dictation on my phone and email his story to Story Worth.

At the end of the year, my daughter will order a bound book of all the stories- a whole collection of memories, an oral history of an elder father that she might never think to ask and will be saved for her and her children to pass on family history. I will order a copy for all her three siblings. Equally important, my husband and I enjoyed writing about his past, and the prompts have brought many vivid memories back to him.

Sweet grandmother holding a beautifully cooked turkey dinner.

 

Filed Under: Aging, Aging Family, Aging Life Care, aging life care manager, Benefits of Reminiscence, Black Aging Family, black care manager, black concieirge nurse, black concierge care manager, black concierge RN, Black Entrepreneur, Black Entrepreneur RB, Black Entrepreneur RN, 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, care management business, care manager, caregiver coaching, CAREGIVER RESOUCES, case manager, Clinical Tools Dysfunctional families, Concierge aging clients, Coronavirus safety elders, COVID -19 Safety, COVID & HOLIDAY SEASON, Covid 19 Webinar, Dementia Activities, Dysfunctional Family & Holidays, Dysfunctional Family Inquiry, elder care manager, Elder Reminicence on Thanksgiving, Emotional Quality of Life, Families, geriatric care manager, geriatric social worker, Holiday Rituals in Aging Family, Long Distance Safety Travel COVID, Long Distance travel Holidays, New Years, nurse advocate, nurse care manager, Oral History, Quality of Life, quality of life -COVID-19, Quality of Life and Reminicance, Quality of Life and Thanksgiving, Quality of Life for elders, quality of life in senior centers, Quality of Life with Dementia, Reminicence on Thanksgiving, Reminicence with elders, Reminiscence Therapy, Remote Thanksgiving Family Visit, Thanksgiving, Thanksgiving Parent crisis, Thanksgiving Safe Visits to Grandma, Thanksgiving with COVID, Thanksgving visits during COVID, Therapist Specializing in Aging, Webinar Tagged With: aging family, aging family Thanksgiving, aging life care manager, aging parent, aging parent care, aging parent Thanksgiving, aging technology, ancrestory.com, assessing for quality of life, black aging family, black american geriatric care managers, black american social workers, Black caregivers, Black Entrepreneurs, Black Heirlooms, Black Nurse Entrepreneurs, Black RN's, Black start-up geriatric care management, Black travel nurses, care manager, care plan, care plan interventions, case manager, COVID VIRTUAL THANKSGIVING VISIT, elders emotional quality of life, family caregivers, Family Caregivers using technology, genealogy, geriatric care management, geriatric care manager, geritaric care manager, grandfather, grandmothers, grandparents, increasing quality of life, LCSW, nurse advocate, nurse care manager, oral history, oral history and quality of life, oral history and You Tube, parent care, Quality of Life, quality of life assessment, reminicence and elder, reminisicsence technology, story telling elders, Story Worth, storytelling and elders, technology for caregivers, Thanksgiving Webinar, Thanksgiving with dysfunctional family, Thanksgiving with midlife siblings, You Tube, You Tube and storytelling

Sell Benefits to Close the GCM or ALCA Sale to Assisted Living

June 20, 2023


Care managers must sell benefits of Geriatric Care Management to assisted living.

Sell Benefits of care managers because GCMs must sell benefits. Care managers are perfect professionals to help assisted living residents if they have just moved in, are unhappy with the move, not participating in activities, isolating depressed, or are lonely – just not thriving in the resident community.

Marketing care management to ALF’s takes some particular marketing tactics 

 

 

GCMs must sell benefits. Although it might seem counterintuitive, consumers rarely want to buy things for the sake of buying them – they want what they purchase to solve their problems.

To borrow from the example of an umbrella, features of this umbrella might be its unbreakable spokes or wind-resistant construction – but the benefit is staying dry even in strong winds that might break lesser umbrellas. The benefit of staying dry in strong winds that break other umbrellas – this makes the sale.

Clients who purchase home care or care management want to buy benefits – They want to know” what’s in it for me” when they buy your service  .

GCM Sell Benefits To Assisted Living 

Let’s take a third party. Care Managers often market to Assisted Living. ALF Directors want to hear how your ALCA or GCM  agency is going to help the Assisted Living site. Of course, you can describe your agency’s features, price, training of staff, gold standard service. However, benefits are what make the sale and keep the Assisted Living dry not flooded by the rain.

But here are some benefits you can offer to Assisted Living when you are seeking referrals and you have a service  for residents that involves Quality Of Life   

YOUR GCM ALCA AGENCIES MUST SELL BENEFITS

Sell Benefits-: Assisted Living does not want residents to move out. Most facilities are strictly non-medical and do not have a one-to-one companion and geriatric care management services. Your geriatric care management agency can solve that problem by selling benefits of 1-1 Companion

 

The assisted living and retirement community population sometimes have clients with needs that cannot be met with their nonmedical, non-one-on-one support services, (usually just an activities director)

  • You will help the facility with residents who are not adjusting to the facility or considering moving by engaging them in activities that will enhance the quality of their life, SO WHAT so they remain in the facility
  • You will help residents not engaging in activities to participate in the ALF’s activities program or outside activities and socialization program through a quality of life assessment & companion, SO WHAT so they do not want to move out of the facility
  • You will engage with new residents who are just adjusting both to the facility and their move, to engage in socialization and activity programs. You can help them make friends & engage in outside activities through a quality of life assessment and companion, SO WHAT so they do not consider moving out
  • You will make monthly monitoring visits to make sure the Companion is meeting all the client’s needs, keep in touch with the family and facility with frequent e-mails, texts or telephone updates plus send a monthly report SO WHAT so everyone is on the same page through your great communication skills.

So, selling the benefits to the third party, who will refer your agency to families of residents who are struggling, is a much more potent selling point that features your agency. 

Sign Up For My Free Webinar   

When: July 20 2023
2 PM-3:30 PM PST
Learn
 

A feature is a fact    A benefit tells your customer the advantages of those facts   

 

Take Advantage of Low Offers on Products

You will learn

The difference between selling features vs benefits

You will learn how to sell the benefits of your services to each 3rd party you  serve

How Benefits make your sale to wealth managers, elder law attorneys, and concierge physicians to get referrals for new clients

The Benefits that make you sell to upscale Assisted Living, accountants, financial planners, Hospice

Step by Step on how to set up meetings with 3rd parties to make the sale

Even if you cannot attend you will get the recording of the webinar the next day if you sign up

SIGN UP 

 

 

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Filed Under: Adult children, Aging Family, aging life business, Aging Life Care Assocaition, aging life care manager, Aging therapist, ALCA Beneifits, ALCA business, Assisted Living, Assisted Living & Geriatric Care Managers, Assisted Living Crisis, Assisted Living sales, Benefit of Assisted Living, Benefits, Benefits & Assisted Living, Benefits of ALCA to Hospice, Benefits of Care Management, Benefits of Geriatric Care Management, Benefits vs Features, Black RN, Black Travel RN, Blog, Care Management Inquiry Call, care management start-up, Concierge Care Manager, Concierge Geriatric Care Manager, Dementia Activities, entitled family, Features vs Benefits, FREE MARKETING WEBINAR, FREE WEBINAR, GCM Benefits, GCM Marketing skills, GCM Start-Up, GCM Webinar, Marketing aging life care, marketing ALCA /GCM, marketing care management, marketing geriatric care management, Marketing plan, Marketing to Assisted Living, marketing to concierge clients, marketing to upper 10%, Move Management, newsletters, nurse advocate, nurse care manager, Quality of Life for elders, Sales ALCA, Sales in geriatric care management, Sales to Assisted Living Tagged With: aging family, aging life care manager, aging parent crisis, benefits of ALCA, Benefits of care management, Benefits vs Features, care manager, case manager, features of ALCA, GCM & Assisted Living, GCM Products and Services, Geriatric Care Sales Assisted Living, geriatric social worker, Marketing to Assisted Living, Monitoring Assisted Living Care, nurse advocate, nurse care manager, Quality of Life in Assisted Living

GCM Benefits Close the Sale to Assisted Living

June 14, 2023

Marketing Tactics – Use Benefits 

GCM Benefits led to a sale.ALCA members need to sell the benefits of Geriatric Care Management to assisted living. Care managers are perfect professionals to help assisted living residents if they have just moved in, are unhappy with the move, are not participating in activities isolating, or are general when they are not thriving in the resident community.

Marketing care management to ALFs takes some particular marketing tactics 

 

 

Although it might seem counterintuitive, consumers rarely want to buy things for the sake of buying them – they want what they purchase to solve their problems.

To borrow from the example of an umbrella, features of this umbrella might be its unbreakable spokes or wind-resistant construction – but the benefit is staying dry even in strong winds that might break lesser umbrellas. The benefit of staying dry in strong winds that break other umbrellas – this makes the sale.

Clients who purchase home care or care management want to buy benefits – what your product or service can do for them.

GCM Benefits To Assisted Living 

Let’s take a third party. Care Managers often market to Assisted Living. ALF Directors want to hear how your ALCA or GCM  agency will help the Assisted Living site. Of course, you can describe your agency’s features, price, staff training, and gold-standard service. However, benefits are what make the sale and keep the Assisted Living dry, not flooded by the rain.

But here are some benefits you can offer to Assisted Living when you are seeking referrals and you have a service  for residents that involves Quality Of Life   

YOUR GCM BENEFITS

The problem: Assisted Living does not want residents to move out. Most facilities are strictly non-medical and do not have a one-to-one companion and geriatric care management services. Your geriatric care management agency can solve that problem through the benefits of ALCA or geriatric care management.

 

The assisted living and retirement community population sometimes have clients with needs that cannot be met with their nonmedical, non-one-on-one support services (usually just an activities director)

  • You will help the facility with residents who are not adjusting to the facility or considering moving by engaging them in activities that will enhance the quality of their life, SO WHAT so they remain in the facility
  • You will help residents not engaging in activities to participate in the ALF’s activities program or outside activities and socialization program through a quality of life assessment & companion, SO WHAT so they do not want to move out of the facility
  • You will engage with new residents adjusting to the facility and their move to engage in socialization and activity programs. You can help them make friends & engage in outside activities through a quality of life assessment and companion, SO WHAT so they do not consider moving out
  • You will make monthly monitoring visits to make sure the Companion is meeting all the client’s needs, keep in touch with the family and facility with frequent e-mails, texts or telephone updates, plus send a monthly report SO WHAT so everyone is on the same page through your great communication skills.

So, selling the benefits to the third party, who will refer your agency to families of struggling residents, is a much more potent selling point that features your agency. 

SIGN UP FOR MY FREE WEBINAR  

Sell Benefits, not Features &Grow Your$ Bottom Line

 Even if you cannot make the webinar, if you sign up, you will get a recording the next day

When: July 20, 2023
2 PM-3:30 PM PST
Learn
 

A feature is a fact 

A benefit tells customers the advantages of those facts

Find out more

 WHEN YOU SIGN UP ,

YOU WILL LEARN

How to create a winning sales pitch to a third party

The difference between selling features vs. benefits

How to sell the benefits of your services to each 3rd party you  serve

What Benefits make your sale to wealth managers, elder law attorneys, and concierge physicians to get referrals for new clients

The Benefits that make your sale to upscale Assisted Living, accountants, financial planners, Hospice

Step by Step on how to set up meetings with 3rd parties to make the sale

Even if you cannot attend, you will get the recording of the webinar the next day if you sign up

SIGN UP

Sign Up

 

 

 

 

 

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Filed Under: Adult children, Aging Family, aging life business, Aging Life Care Assocaition, aging life care manager, Aging therapist, ALCA Beneifits, ALCA business, Assisted Living, Assisted Living & Geriatric Care Managers, Assisted Living Crisis, Assisted Living sales, Benefit of Assisted Living, Benefits, Benefits & Assisted Living, Benefits of ALCA to Hospice, Benefits of Care Management, Benefits of Geriatric Care Management, Benefits vs Features, Black RN, Black Travel RN, Blog, Care Management Inquiry Call, care management start-up, Concierge Care Manager, Concierge Geriatric Care Manager, Dementia Activities, entitled family, Features vs Benefits, FREE MARKETING WEBINAR, FREE WEBINAR, GCM Benefits, GCM Marketing skills, GCM Start-Up, GCM Webinar, Marketing aging life care, marketing ALCA /GCM, marketing care management, marketing geriatric care management, Marketing plan, Marketing to Assisted Living, marketing to concierge clients, marketing to upper 10%, Move Management, newsletters, nurse advocate, nurse care manager, Quality of Life for elders, Sales ALCA, Sales in geriatric care management, Sales to Assisted Living Tagged With: aging family, aging life care manager, aging parent crisis, Benefits, Benefits Care Managers, benefits of ALCA, Benefits of care management, Benefits to assisted Living, Benefits vs Features, black american geriatric care managers, black american social workers, Black Nurse Entrepreneurs, Black RN's, Black start-up geriatric care management, Black travel nurses, care manager, case manager, Features and Benefits of GCM, features of ALCA, GCM & Assisted Living, GCM Products and Services, Geriatric Care Sales Assisted Living, geriatric social worker, Marketing to Assisted Living, Monitoring Assisted Living Care, nurse advocate, nurse care manager, Quality of Life in Assisted Living

Make Reminiscence a Valentines Gift for Aging Clients- 5 Ways

February 9, 2023

Make Reminiscence a Valentine’s Gift

Make reminiscence Valentine’s gift for clients.  A great Valentine’s for your client is you the care manager or a caregiver, using reminiscence to gather a client’s memories.

Reminiscence isn’t new. Before the printing press, storytellers and bards were how history was recorded-

You can watch The History Channel to get a history of the world. But History also exists in a family, and you can make your elder family members oral storytellers on Valentine’s Day.

Storytelling only works if the teller remembers the lines. Family history has to be captured when the older person still remembers. So holiday events are a perfect time to tap into that font before it flickers.

Here are some tips to use if you want to capture these family tales during Valentine’s visits with older clients—a perfect time to do this.

1. First, arrive with a real Valentine’s card Just a card that can evoke old memories

2. Reminiscence is Valentine’s gift when you use empathetic listening Make all the messages you give the older person— tone, how fast you speak, how they are sitting- say, “I want to listen to you.” This in itself is a gift to an older person as few people really listen to them as they age.

Reminiscence is Valentine’s gift

3. Reminiscence is Valentine’s gift when you ask questions that prompt the story but don’t make judgments. If there are going to record the family tale,  on your I phone, record it in a way that doesn’t distract or stop the older person from talking.

Reminiscence is Valentine’s gift

4. Reminiscence is the perfect Valentine’s gift when viewing old family photos as memory prompts.

5. Start somewhere. If the elder isn’t going to tell stories on his or her own, start the story and see if they will follow along.” Did you go to Valentine’s parties as when you were a kid or celebrate the day in school by exchanging valentines?” Did you have a special valentine as a teenager or young adult?”

6. If the client has dementia you can still do this with reminiscence prompts like a valentine, chocolate, some flowers, old photos, or a simple valentine decoration you bring.

7. Or contact the family, if they will visit or call, and teach them how to do reminiscence and do this each holiday they may spend with the older loved one.

 

8. Use technology tools to help you with this legacy building for your older client like Life Bio-    or

Quick Voice Recorder

to catch the memory on your phone.

Story Worth

Filed Under: Adult children, Aging, Aging Family, Aging Life Care, aging life care manager, black care manager, black concieirge nurse, black concierge care manager, Black Entrepreneur, Black Entrepreneur RB, Black Entrepreneur RN, 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 manager, case manager, Dementia Activities, elder care manager, Families, Geriatric Care Management Business, geriatric care manager, Geriatric Care Manager, geriatric social worker, Gifts for clients on Valentines Day, nurse advocate, nurse care manager, Oral History, Quality of Life, Quality of Life for elders, Quality of Life with Dementia, Reminicence and Photos, Reminiscence Therapy, Valentines gifts for family caregivers, Valentines&Reminicence Tagged With: aging family, aging life care manager, aging life or geriatric care manager, care manager, case manager, geriatric care management, nurse advocate, nurse care manager, Reminiscence on the Holidays, reminiscence technology, Reminiscence Therapy, Valentines Day, Valentines Day Gift for caregivers

A Good Life to the Very End-Last Day Sign Up 4 Free Webinar-

January 23, 2023

Last Day to Sign Up  Free Webinar –Add Death and Dying to Your Care Management Agency

Serve Your Client Until Death Do You Part

Join me Tuesday January 24cathy, and learn why End of Life Services Are a perfect new service for care managers 

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

1. What is a Death Doula https://cathycress.com/events/

S

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

Sign Up 

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

A Good Life to the Very End 

With “a Good Life to the Very End” Atul Gawande’s acclaimed book, “Being Mortal“ opened our eyes to avoiding a medical way of death. He showed millions of readers how the quality of life and human interaction while dying trump the number of years gained through questionable painful procedures and dying in an institution. He tells us that “our ultimate, goal, after, is not a good death but a good life to the very

A Good Life to the very End

end. Learn how to deliver the good death through the 5 stages of the end of life. Get your client to hospice and palliative care when they need it not in the last 15 days of their life. Offer a Quality of life to death at home, not in the hospital where there will be the medicalization of death, not a good death and find out what is a death doula and how they can work with care managers

Sign up for this free webinar to learn how you can do this as an aging professional who wants to whole of aging and the end of aging to offer a Good Life to the Very End.

Filed Under: Aging Life Care, aging life care manager, Blog, Death and Dying, Death and Dying Care Management, End of Life, Families, geriatric care manager, Geriatric Care Manager, geriatric social worker, Hospice Care, nurse advocate, nurse care manager, Palliative Care, Palliative care manager, Quality of Life for elders, Quality of Life in Death, Quality of Life in Dying Tagged With: adding end of life services, aging family, aging life care manager, aging parent care, aging parent crisis, ALCA in End Of Life, care manager, case manager, disputes at end of life, elderly at end of life, end of life care manager, end of life family meeting, Fighting and Feuding at end of life, free webinar, GCM Family Coaching end of life, geriatric care manager, Navigation through END of LIfe, nurse advocate, nurse care manager, webinar end of life

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