Cathy Cress

Expert in Aging Life and Geriatric Care Management

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Care Managers in End-of-Lift- What is their Role?

January 19, 2023

 

Care managers at end-of-life

Care managers at end-of-life don’t just meet dying patients and their bereft children in the emergency room.

Care Managers at end-of-life can bring in Death Doulas to help the family caregivers follow through with what hospice has taught them as caregivers of their loved ones. Or they themselves can be certified as Death Doulas  to help the families through the caregiver journey for a job they never were trained for whole they grieve at the same time

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 is called. Often GCM’s can help the family and client to bring in hospice or palliative care.

 The final passage through life can be emotionally charged.  If the family is following a long labyrinth to the end, the blind alleys may be blocked by cultural, religious, and moral beliefs. Care managers can find an opening through this maze.  Money, family dynamics, and fear of dying can all explode a fraught crisis of care in dying. When important end-of-life decisions need to be made, the stress of the responsibility and the seriousness of the situation can break a wave of distress fear, and anxiety over the “whole family system” of the dying elder. The geriatric care manager specializes in this whole family syst

 Care Managers  in end-of-life often help facilitate throbbing discussions and facilitate family members coming together t

Care managers at end-of-life

Sign Up for our new Webinar Deliver a Good End of Life 9 Steps to Death &Dying

Care managers AT end-of-life

Hospice trains the family of the dying person to be the caregivers only once, but their primary focus is the dying person. Death doulas are an adjunct to the medically trained professionals in hospices. They reinforce hospice training. ( For example  fear family has of giving morphine in a needle  in spite of training )Death Doulas give emotional support to the patient and family of the dying person and sources respite, support groups, and help with caregiver burnout for the family, among other caregiver issues at death, They are an alternative to the medicalization of death in the US, described by Atul Gawande. Care Managers at end of life can work well with Death Doulas. We will feature an interview with Patty urban a Death Doulas and a geriatric care manager and member of ALCA

Join Us

Learn About Death Doulas

Upcoming Free Webinar

Deliver a Good End of Life 9 Steps to Death &Dying

Jan 24, 2023, 02:00 PM Pacific Time (US and Canada)

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We will feature an interview with Patty Urban a Death Doulas and a geriatric care manager and member of ALCA

FIND OUT MORE 

 

Death Doula

Learn

What is a death doula?

what exactly does a death doula do?

Do Death Doula work with Hospice, Care Managers, or just families

Is there a Charge

How can I contact a Death Doula

How can a care manager be trained as a Death Doula

Patti Urban, a Certified Dementia Practitioner, Senior Advisor, and End of Life Doula, is the owner of Aging Care Planning Solutions, a geriatric care management and end-of-life planning practice.

Description

Deliver a Good End of Life- Atul Gawande

9 Steps to Add Death and Dying to Your Care Management Agency

 

Serve Your Client until Death Do You Part
Join me on January 24 2023 and learn why End of Life Services re a perfect new service for care managers

Care managers at end-of-life

Learn to guide the patient/family through the five stages of death. Understand how to help clients be active participants in their care. Give the family caregivers tools to manage care. Find out how to provide family-centered care to caregivers and families. Learn to choose the right support services for the client through all stages of death.
Introduce Hospice and Palliative care to the client earlier and work with their team and a Death Doula for non-medical support
Discover the role of Death Doula at end of life.

  • 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 care4. Provide family center care to caregivers and family5. Choose the right support services through all stages of death6. Introduce Hospice and Palliative care and work with their team
  • 7. Understand the Role of the Death Doula

Time

Jan 24, 2023, 02:00 PM Pacific Time (US and Canada)

SIGN-UP 

 

 

Gwendolyn LAZO Harris MA, CT, Seniors at Home, San Francisco and Diane LeVan MA both highly expert care managers, created a seminal chapter on  End of Life Care Manager in my book Care Manager’s Working With the Aging Family  

Filed Under: Aging, Aging Life Care, aging life care manager, Blog, care manager, case manager, Death and Dying Care Management, death and dying care manager, elder care manager, Families, Geriatric Care Management Business, geriatric care manager, Geriatric Care Manager, geriatric social worker, ife care manager, nurse care manager Tagged With: aging life and geraitric care manager, Care managers in end-of-life, death and dying, end of life care manager, geriatric care manager, Hospice Care, hospice for elderly parent

Sign Up for My Webinar on Death Doulas and End of Life

January 11, 2023

Si

Add Death Doula &Death and Dying to Your Care Management Agency

Deliver a Good End of Life-

Add Death and Dying to Your Care Management Agency

Serve Your Client until Death Do You Part

This webinar is free

Join me on January  24 and 2 PM and learn why End of Life Services Are a perfect new service for care managers

Find Out More 

Sign up for my free webinar on Death Doulas

Death Doula – What is that?-In this 1 ½ -hour webinar you will learn “What is Death Doula and how Care managers can work with them.

Sign up for my webinar on Death Doulas and End of Life.  In A Washington Post, this week a Post article said that Death Doulas have become a nationwide death-positive, national movement mirroring the traditional ritual in Mexico that many Americans also celebrate, the Day of the Dead. That ritual holiday celebrates death as a positive part of life by remembering those who have died, honoring them with flowers ( marigolds), and “commemorating death as another element of life.

We live in a culture that is afraid of death- where death, like birth, was hidden in institutions, like nursing homes and hospitals for decades so that families never had to experience it. This hiding away from the entrance and exit of life is one reason why we fear death. Death-like birth used to occur at home, where families could see and feel the dying person, hold them, and smell them, so those fears were not there. Now like a birth, that can happen at home death can too at home with the help of a  geriatric care manager and a Death Doula who like a midwife of birth –  is a midwife of death. This a reason you should sign up for my webinar on Deliver of Good End of Life.

Sign up for my free webinar in Death Doulas and  End of Life and learn from an interview with Patti Urban ALCA care manager and Death Doula

What is a death doula? 

what exactly does a death doula do?

Do Death Doula work with Hospice, Care Managers, or just families

Is there a Charge

How can I contact a Death Doula

How can a care manager be trained as a Death Doula?

 

Patti, a Certified Dementia Practitioner, Senior Advisor, and End of Life Doula, is the owner of Aging Care Planning Solutions, a geriatric care management and end-of-life planning practice.  She is the former Executive Director of Shoreline of Clinton, a memory care assisted living community, and the former owner of Comfort Keepers, a home care company serving seniors, both located in Connecticut.  She is the founder of the Shoreline Area Senior Network, a local networking and educational group for professionals serving the senior community along the Connecticut Shoreline.  Currently, she is a member of the Advisory Council of the Agency on Aging of South Central Connecticut and is a former Board Member of the Shoreline Eldercare Alliance, Association of Women Business Leaders, Orchard House Adults Day Center, Shoreline Chamber of Commerce, and National Speakers Association Connecticut Chapter.

She resides in Connecticut and is the mother of three daughters and one son, all adopted from China.  She can be reached at 845-641-8123, pattiurban@agingcarePS.com, and www.agingcarePS.com.

Sign Up for my free Webinar

Sign up for my webinar on Death Doulas

We will Also Cover Serve Your Client until Death Do You Part

  • Transition the patient/family through the five stages of death
  • Help clients be active participants in their care
  • Give the family/caregiver tools to manage care
  • Provide family center care to  family caregivers and family
  • Choose the right support services through all stages of death
  • Introduce Hospice and Palliative care and work with their team
  • Use ALCA End-of-Life Benefits During COVID
  • 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

Filed Under: 5 stages of death, 5 Stages of Dying, 5 stages of End of Life, Acute Stage of Dying, Aging deaths, Aging Family, aging life business, Aging Life Care, aging life care manager, ALCA Role Death and Dying, Atul Gawande, black care manager, black concieirge nurse, black concierge care manager, black concierge RN, Black Entrepreneur, Black Entrepreneur RB, Black Entrepreneur RN, Black Geriatric Care Manager, Black RN, black RN care manager, black social worker, black travel nurse, Black Travel Nurses, Black Travel RN, Blog, Concierge aging clients, Concierge Care Manager, Death & Dying, Death and Dying Care Management, death and dying care manager, End of Life, End of Life Care manager, End of Life Cultural Assessment, Five Stages of Death, FREE WEBINAR, GCM role Death and Dying, GCM workinh with hospice, geriatric care management emergency proceduress, Geriatric Care Manager, Good end of life, Good hospice, nurse advocate, Palliative Care, Quality of Life in Death, Quality of Life in Dying, Recovery phase of death, US Medicalization of Death Tagged With: 5 stages of death, Acceptance Phase of Death, adding end of life services, aging family, aging life care manager, aging parent care, aging parent crisis, Aging SNF deaths, Benefits of Care Managers To Hospice, care manager, case manager, chronic phase of death, COVID-19 Deaths, COVID-19 deaths SNF's, death and dying, Death Doula, Death Douls at end of life, Deaths in Nursing Homes, disputes at end of life, end of life care, end of life care manager, End of Life Diagnosis, families fretting at end of life, family meeting end of life, Free Webinar geriatric care management, Free webinar on end of life, GCM in Death and Dying, geriatric assessment for end of life, Hospice, Hospice at end of life, Hospice Care, hospice for elderly parent, nurse advocate, nurse care manager

Can You Give a Good Death without” Rage, Rage Against the Dying of the Light”?

March 9, 2021

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Dylan’s Thomas warns us in his poem

 

Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at  close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

 Give a good death – not a cold terrifying dying of the light.

 

But today a care manager or geriatric social worker can help an older client go gentle into that good night, they do not have to burn and rage at the close of their day because you will be giving them as Atul Gawande suggests – a good death – not a cold terrifying dying of the light.

 

The terminal phase of any life-threatening illness is the time between diagnosis and the final decline when no cure or extension of life is in the offing. The individual confronts progressive decline and deterioration. Death is imminent. The care manager has a role.

The focus of doctors and patients now changes from attempting to cure the illness or prolong life to trying to provide relief from pain and to comfort the sufferer. Religious concerns such as what happens after someone passes away or how to handle the suffering at the end of life or how to give comfort to family members are the focus during this time as well as trying to tie up any loose ends.

Death to Rage About- Alone in the Hospital

But in the time of the plague, when  95.5 % of souls still die in the hospital and not at

home the care manager has a critical role with the family. High tech introduced by the care manager and at times the hospital with the care manager coordinating the family outsides and unable to touch their dying loved one – can make this death full of rage more gentle as the person passes into the night.

Care Manager tasks:

Make a referral to hospice if the family has not  already reached out

Partner with hospice and work under them

Monitor anticipatory grief needs

 Communicate that this is the end (and time to say goodbye)

 Assess spiritual needs and contact the appropriate religious-spiritual counselors to provide comfort and healing.

 Encourage family members to say The Four Things That Matter Most   “Please forgive me”, “I forgive you”, “Thank you”, and “I love you”.

Assess the need for paid caregivers to help the family or help family members share round the clock care among family and friends

 Support the family members in their need to grieve and have respite by continuing to assess for overload and burn out with a caregiver assessment tool 

Prepare family for the active phase of dying which can be loud and disturbing to someone who is not aware of what will occur

Bring in technology if death is alone in the hospital

 

Join me Thursday, March 11, 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 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

 

Gwendolyn LAZO Harris MA, CT, Seniors at Home, San Francisco and Diane LeVan MA both highly expert care managers, created a seminal chapter “Palliative Care and End of Life Care Manager ” in my book Care Manager’s Working With the Aging Family  

 

 

Filed Under: 5 Stages of Dying, 5 stages of End of Life, Aging, Aging Family, aging family crisis, aging life business, Aging Life Care, Aging Life Care Assocaition, aging life care manager, ALCA Role Death and Dying, Blog, care manager, case manager, Death & Dying, Death and Dying Care Management, death and dying care manager, elder care manager, End of Life, End of Life Care manager, End of life documents, Families, Five Stages of Death, geriatric care manager, Geriatric Care Manager, geriatric social worker, Good Death, nurse advocate, nurse care manager, Palliative care manager, Webinar, Webinar ALCA GCM Tagged With: 5 stages of death, adding geriatric care management, aging life care manager, ALCA &end of life, ALCA Death and Dying, Atul Gawande nurse care manager eldercare manager, Benefits Care Managers, Benefits of Care Managers To Hospice, care manager, case manager, death and dying, eldercare manager, end of life care, free webinar, geriatric care manager, Hospice at end of life, Hospice Care, Palliative Care, terminal phase of dying, US medicaization of Death

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

What Is a Care Manager’s Role in the Hospital during COVID in End of Life

February 2, 2021

Care managers cannot meet dying  COVID-19 patients and their bereft children in the emergency room or Hospital. They are not allowed in due to COVID restrictions. However, care Managers play a big role in end of life issues, while family remains in the community and the client is isolated from them in the hospital.

Procedures for the family when loved one in the hospital.

The care manager was help by

1.creating a communication plan from the outset and figuring out who’s the “medical quarterback” in charge of monitoring a loved one. Typically, this is a specialist, such as a hospitalist, critical care medicine doctor, or intensivis2.

 2.Facilitating family meeting for family while loved one in the hospital

3.Suggesting technology family can use to communicate with loved one and with other family members or friends

4.. Help family understand the part family can play I admissions- preparing a go binder ahead of time etc.,

  1. By designating one person to speak for the whole family- the process to improve family getting information from overloaded hospital staff

6 Preparing family & loved one’s medical team for communication death in the hospital – what care manager can do to assist

7.. Supporting the family member when they are dying while not being present

8.. Bereavement of family post-death- use of hospice

Care Managers are their navigators through all five stages of dying

They many times can introduce palliative care or hospice and often GCM’s can help the family and client to bring in hospice or palliative care long before the average time, which is the last month or 15 days before death.

 The final passage through life can be emotionally charged.  

If the family is following a long labyrinth to the end, the blind alleys may be blocked by cultural, religious, and moral beliefs and now COCID -19 regulations. Care managers can find an opening through this maze.  Money, family dynamics, and fear of dying can all explode a fraught crisis of care in dying. When the important end-of-life decisions need to be made, the stress of the responsibility and the seriousness of the situation can break a wave of distress fear and anxiety over the “whole family system” the dying elder. The geriatric care manager specializes in this whole family system.

 Care Managers can often help facilitate throbbing discussions

They can facilitate family members coming together to work as a functional

unit.  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 relieves the family of the burden of having the responsibility of making decisions that may not be what their parents want. Turning this around can also avoid family conflicts when adult children may have differing values.

Helping family Legally plan for Death

 Proactive discussions and legal planning building a circle of care can help to reduce some of the potential conflicts. Good legal guidance can also help to pay for care when an adult child wants to finance in-home care. They can point the family to legal guidance to prepare end of life documents, that are so important, especially now with COVID when death can come so quickly but geriatric care managers do much more with clients and families who are facing the end of life

 

 

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

 

Serve Your Client until Death Do You Part

 

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

 

 In this 1 ½ -hour  FREE 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 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

 

Gwendolyn LAZO Harris MA, CT,Seniors at Home , San Francisco and Diane LeVan MA both highly expert care managers, created a seminal chapter on Palliative Care and End of Life Care Manager in my book Care Manager’s Working With the Aging Family 

Filed Under: Aging, Aging Life Care, aging life care manager, Blog, care manager, case manager, Death and Dying Care Management, death and dying care manager, elder care manager, Families, Geriatric Care Management Business, Geriatric Care Manager, geriatric care manager, geriatric social worker, ife care manager, nurse care manager Tagged With: 5 stages of death, adding end of life services, aging family, aging life and geraitric care manager, aging life care manager, aging parent care, aging parent crisis, ALCA COVID benefits, death and dying, death and dying in COVID-19, 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, GCM Family Coaching end of life, geriatric care manager, Hospice at end of life, Hospice Care, hospice for elderly parent, nurse advocate, nurse care manager, Palliative Care at end of life, support services in death, Tools to manage end of life

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