A Five Minute Survey for Elder Care Givers
Question #1: How healthy is your elder?
1) My elder is extremely healthy — physically active and very fit.
2) My elder is reasonably healthy. Any concerns or conditions are under control.
3) My elder is of declining health. Controlling medical conditions is a concern, and they have a hard time staying healthy.
4.) My elder is in poor health. Medical conditions are not well controlled; they have a chronic illness, require pain management or palliative care, etc.
5) I don’t know.
Question #2: How would you rate your elder’s emotional state?
1) My elder is in great emotional health: happy, upbeat, and looking forward to every day.
2) My elder is in reasonable emotional health. There are up days and down days, just like anyone else.
3) My elder is in declining emotional health. They seem sad, depressed or just down a good deal of the time, or have a lot of anger and rage against the world.
4) My elder is in poor emotional health. They are depressed, mentally ill, or hostile.
5) I don’t know.
Question #3: How does your elder handle everyday household tasks — meal preparation, cleaning the house, getting dressed?
1) My elder is absolutely independent and can do all these tasks for them self.
2) My elder can do most tasks, but may require senior care help with heavy lifting or difficult tasks.
3) My elder dresses independently, but does not make meals nor clean the house.
4) My elder needs senior care help in all of these areas.
5) I don’t know.
Question #4: Does your elder remember everything as well as they once did?
1) Absolutely! My elder has great long and short term memory. They can remember what they did ten years ago AND ten minutes ago.
2) My elder is about average. They remember most things, but every now and then, something ’slips away’ from them.
3) While my elder is doing fine remembering things from long ago, recent events or information doesn’t seem to ’sink in’.
4) My elder seems to be forgetting many things, including familiar faces, places, and things. He/she has started to become easily confused.
5) I don’t know.
Question #5: Does your elder handle paying bills, scheduling doctor’s appointments, etc?
1) Yes, completely independently, and there’s never been a problem.
2) Mostly, although I’ve started checking to make sure nothing gets missed.
3) My elder does some of these tasks themselves, and has someone else do some of them.
4) My elder doesn’t handle any of this.
5) I don’t know.
Please add up your total points, using the number of your answer to create your total.
Up to 10 points: Congratulations! It sounds like your Elder is in great shape. What a perfect time to start pro-actively planning for these special years. You’re acting early to ensure that everything goes as smoothly as possible. Great job! Click here to get the process started!
11-19 points: There are some concerns; if not now, then on the horizon. Kudos to you for taking action now! This is the time to act to correct problems and to prevent troubling situations from becoming worse. Contact us and we’ll go further into your individual elder’s situation and what your options are.
20-25 points: You’re in the right place. It sounds like there are some serious concerns that bear closer examination. Often, identifying where problems are is the hardest part of this process. Once we do that, we can move on to creating solutions! Contact us and let’s start talking about what your elder needs.
