Caregiver

Being a caregiver is filled with struggles and responsibilities.  It's an endless everyday battle against obstacles and pulling forces. When you manage to overcome one, another one surfaces.  There are no specific rules or guidelines that will tell you how to be a caregiver as every case will be different and will require decision making on the spot.  There are however, a few concepts that should be kept in mind and will make you a better caregiver.

How much thought should families give into which caretaker they choose to look over their loved ones? Considering how often caretakers are in the news for doing the opposite of their job entails, it’s abundantly clear families should be giving a lot of thought as to exactly who is taking care of their relatives.

As our society grows older new challenges arise that we must face as a whole, e.g. the tremendous demographic change that will soon be at our footsteps. With each passing day 10,000 baby boomers reach 65 years of age and over the next quarter-century the population of elders is expected to double.

It’s a cold, hard fact that caregivers need medical supplies – often by the bulk – to take care of an aging and/or sick loved one. Therefore, it would be very easy to come up with this sales pitch: “this Christmas save a caregiver you know and love a lot of trouble (and yourself a lot of money) and present them with the gift of cheap medical stuff online.” But we’re not here just to make your life easier; we’re also here to challenge you. And to show you that capitalism can peacefully co-exist with the Christmas spirit. And that it’s not just thoughts that count but actions as well.  In summary, that as far as support goes a crutch can be a moral crutch as well as an actual crutch, as long as you coat it with an Extra Layer of Meaning. For example:

Many caregivers face a conundrum when it comes to an aging parent’s ability to drive – or lack thereof. On the one hand, driving is one of the greatest signs of freedom and independence there is, regardless of age. Accordingly, it is one of the last shreds of independence an older adult is willing to surrender. On the other hand, sometimes there simply is no other way around it than to have Dan Aykroyd hire Morgan Freeman to drive Jessica Tandy around. Seems harsh, but that’s just the reality of it.

According to the US News & World Report there are 4 things you should never say to a caregiver. And according to the Huffington Post, there are a further 8 things that you should never say to a caregiver. But as a caregiver, would you really not want to hear at least a few of these things? Are they all worthy of Jeff Foxworthy’s “Here’s your sign”? Let’s analyze these things here at Discount Medical Supplies.

Proper communication between cancer patients, their caregivers and doctors helps to improve the former’s wellbeing and quality of life. According to the National Cancer Institute, when patients with cancer, family caregivers, and the medical care team communicate well each with the others, the patient:

Caregivers use home care medical supplies to provide dying loved ones with a better quality of life. But the fact alone of choosing to die at home instead of the hospital might just literally give your loved one a new lease on life. A large Japanese study found that cancer patients who died at home tended to outlive those who died in hospitals. The researchers discovered that patients who died at home had a considerably longer survival period than that of patients who died in hospitals, even after adjusting for demographic and clinical characteristics, among other factors.

A caregiver is not just a caregiver – first and foremost, he or she is a husband, a wife, a son, a daughter, or a friend. And when it comes to caring for someone with cancer, the role of the caregiver goes through many a change at several different points in the course of the disease. For example, a caregiver should play a major role as a member of the medical care team right from the beginning. As treatment approaches become more advanced, patients live longer and better and have an increased chance to be cared for at home. As a result, many duties that were formerly performed by doctors and nurses can be done at home by a caregiver – such as organizing and administering medications.

Caregivers of people with cancer should consider enrolling their loved one in a cancer clinical trial for two reasons. First, it is an opportunity to be among the first in line to receive a new treatment. And second, it is a way to help develop future alternatives that might prevent and, who knows, even cure cancer – and since a risk factor for cancer is family history, this is something that close relatives should definitely be interested in. There are no guarantees, but most currently used methods to prevent, detect, and treat cancer did start as clinical trials. There are trials available for all stages of cancer, though some only accept people who have not been treated yet.