When it comes to helping elderly residents living their lives to the fullest, meaningful and well-planned social activities play an important role. As a professional caregiver, you have to ensure that the activities you are planning for the residents in the care home are purposeful and interesting. As per a 3-year study published in The Telegraph, 6 out of 10 elderly respondents don’t participate in the events or activities that are specifically designed for them. This goes on to show the importance of listening to the residents and ensuring that their voices are heard while making an activity plan for them.
1.Listen to them and don’t be patronising: When planning for the activities, hobbies and the interests of the elderly participants must be taken into account – there’s no two ways about it. While planning, ensure that you are involving the residents in decision making. Elderly residents have a lot to give back to the society and you must harness their knowledge and wisdom to make services better for them.
2.Start planning ahead: Talk about the upcoming event weeks before the date. Ask the elderly residents to sign up for the event. Then send a questionnaire to the interested residents asking about their interests, food preferences, activity ideas, music preferences and other important information pertaining to the event.
3.Build a team: To ensure that the activities and the event goes as planned, build a support team. Delegate work to different team members – for instance, if you are arranging for music and decoration, then another team member can take the responsibility of arranging catering. Everyday hold a short meeting with the team to discuss the updates and progress on each task.
4.Safety: When planning for the event, check for the safety and comfort of the residents. For instance, remove non-slip rugs from the area. For seating, arrange for comfortable and accessible seats. Make the area wheelchair accessible.
The key to providing person-centered care is to understand each resident’s unique needs. To achieve this, a positive workplace environment is needed where the caregivers are encouraged to spend more time with the residents. However, in many care homes in the UK, caregivers spend their precious time doing manual work such as reviewing medication mar charts after every medication round. To help caregivers spend more time on the ward and less time doing paperwork, care home managers should try automating time-consuming processes like medication administration.
With the help of eMAR (digital medical administration record sheet) care homes can significantly reduce medication errors. Learn how electronic MAR sheets are helping care homes and supported living services streamline the medication administration process.