Each year the last week of August is considered National Safe at Home week. It’s a great time to review your home to see if any safety hazards need to be addressed and corrected.
As the adult child of an aging parent, you might feel a bit overwhelmed about all the areas of your parent’s home to review for safety. It might be easier to break it into smaller, more focused tasks. This could help you focus on getting one area done and then move on to the next. However you choose to do it, if you have hired someone else to provide Home Care Assistance as well as yourself, it’s a bright idea to include them in the conversation. They might see something that you haven’t.
One key area to focus on is the stairs where your parent lives. Stairs are often where people trip and fall, so be proactive to keep the stairs safe where your aging parent lives. Here are a few areas to look at for each set of stairs.
Lighting
All staircases should be well lit. Lighting helps your parent see if there are any obstacles on the stairs, where the top and bottom steps are, as well as how many steps there are. Even if your parent has used the stairs hundreds of times, good lighting will ensure that he can see where he needs to step every time. This can be fixed by quickly having your home care assistance provider check lightbulbs to ensure they’re replaced as soon as they burn out. You might also consider adding small night lights along the steps to provide some illumination.
Railings
Please don’t make your parent rely on her hand on the wall to steady herself up and down stairs. While that might help her steady herself, it won’t help if she loses balance as she’ll have nothing to grip onto. For most stairs, it’s a relatively easy DIY project to install a railing on at least one side of them.
If you currently have railings, ask your home care assistance provider to help you check each one for sturdiness and to alert you when and if they become loose. Older homes especially can have loose railings that need to be tightened.
Flooring
Your parent’s stairs should be non-slip and level. If there is carpet on any stairs, check to ensure no loose edges are sticking up that could easily cause your parent to trip. If stairs are outside and can get wet from the rain or icy from the cold, look for ways to keep them as safe as possible. You can purchase anti-slip treads explicitly made for wooden stairs, concrete stairs, and any other type of material. You can even purchase them with reflective strips to help your parent see where she’s stepping at night.
The stairs are just the beginning. Use this weekly awareness holiday to make sure all of your parent’s living space is safe for her and her guests.
For more information about how the caregivers at La Jolla Nurses Homecare can help your aging parents remain in their own homes, call 858-454-9339. We are a home care agency providing quality and affordable senior care in La Costa, CA, and the surrounding communities.
Today we are the oldest and most experienced private duty agency in San Diego County.She saw a need for quality private duty home health care and she worked diligently to build an agency that filled that need.I am proud to say, her vision is carried on today with our dedicated staff.
I believe our tenure in the community speaks well for us.We have had the opportunity to be of service to countless interesting individuals, including local and worldwide celebrities.It is the people we care for that makes this a fascinating industry.Whether high profile or a more ordinary citizen, we are proud that thousands have entrusted us with their care or the care of their loved ones.Our Mission is to provide high quality, very secure and the most compassionate home health care.We believe that patients heal faster and are happiest when they can stay in their homes.”
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