As one year turns into the next, caregivers often reflect on ways to better support older loved ones during the coming months. Caregiving is no easy task, but thankfully, you don’t have to do it alone. Make connecting with WestMass ElderCare (WMEC) a part of your resolution this New Year. We’re always ready to help with programs and services individualized to meet your loved one’s needs. Here are just four ways you can get more support for your loved one this year:
1. Get a Personalized Care Plan
Whether you have specific goals or you need a general roadmap for providing care, WMEC can help you create a Personalized Care Plan. Our nursing staff meets with older adults and their caregivers to discuss their specific needs, challenges, goals, and current resources. With this information in hand, they outline how you can best serve your loved one’s unique needs. These plans might include tips for providing support, services to consider hiring, advocacy options, or ways to access funds and resources you may not have known about!
2. Get Healthy Meals Without the Cooking
At the end of the day, keeping older adults safe and independent requires proper sustenance. WMEC’s Nutrition Programs provide one-third of a day’s nutrition needs and so much more. As a caregiver, you can ensure your loved one receives a delicious, healthy meal while giving yourself a break from making it or running out to buy it.
WMEC’s Home-delivered meals program and Community Table Congregate Dining Sites provide nutritious meals to older adults and eligible younger community members with disabilities. We can accommodate special dietary restrictions like diabetic, low-sodium, cardiac, or renal meals. Additionally, Latino meals offer the preferred cuisine of many in the Hispanic Community, so no one goes hungry!
Participants in the Nutrition Program also receive regular check-ins from an English or Spanish-speaking case manager. Not only does this ensure they’re fed, it provides an important safety check to monitor consumers’ social and physical wellbeing. This means you have a supporter who knows your aging parent and can work with you to support them as their needs change over time. Want to learn more? Read an enlightening account from a WMEC Nutrition Case Manager, Jesse Abreu.
3. Get Paid for Caregiving
Asking for outside help can be a giant leap of faith for many seniors. Instead of trusting a stranger, they turn to someone like you, a family member or neighbor they’re familiar with and know will support them in the ways they’d like. Luckily with WMEC’s Adult Family Care program, you can receive compensation for caring for an older family member or friend in your home! AFC allows qualified caregivers to receive payment as well as tools, educational opportunities, and other resources to make their caregiving journey easier.
4. Get Bilingual Support
Everyone in our community deserves support to live as independently as possible. English isn’t everyone’s primary language, and WMEC has staff and services that recognize this. If your loved one speaks Spanish and wants a larger community or needs more support than you can give alone, be sure to look into bilingual services from WestMass Eldercare. Our bilingual team members work hard to ensure that you can get the support you need for your aging parent’s care. Our goal is to build trust with all of our consumers and delivering services in a consumer’s native language is an important step in this effort.
These are just four of the quality services we offer to help members of our community in need. If you’re still looking for ways to support your loved ones, we encourage you to explore our website for details on our other programs, latest events, consumer testimonials, and so much more. Contact us to get started!
