Caring for the elderly, much like caring for children, requires utmost delicacy and patience. Both require healthcare providers to deliver care with an understanding that is appropriate to their ages. However, the difference lies in the decision-making in the care administration for each age group.
Naturally, as we age, our bodies age, become weak and are more vulnerable to illnesses. A person’s lifestyle could also affect their body as they age. In addition, outside of physical changes, the psychological aspect of a person changes and adjusts over time. Understanding how these changes influence how patients become as they age is significant in allowing one to provide proper and effective geriatric care for them.
What is Geriatric Care?
Geriatrics is a kind of healthcare that revolves around providing care for the aging population, particularly the frail elderly. This healthcare specialty aims to promote elderly health by preventing and treating diseases and aiding them with their disabilities. There is no established age range to which one must be under a geriatrician’s care. However, most who seek geriatric care are 65 years old or older patients.
Geriatrics care is given in a person-centered manner, which means that one must recognize that every patient is unique in their condition and needs. They are cared for with dignity and respect primarily since geriatric care revolves around older people who’ve been through a lot in their lives. Professionals specializing in the field must always include their patients, residents, or families in decision-making processes.
These processes involve medical decisions that directly impact the patient’s health. But, rather than the elderly patients adhering to any treatment or care plans immediately, they are free to provide any concerns. Geriatricians must ensure that any proceedings are gone over by their patients thoroughly as they ultimately have autonomy over their health.
Geriatric Care Through a Biopsychosocial Approach
Unlike biomedical approaches to patient care, where treatment administration is via medical/medicinal, the biopsychosocial model encompasses a much broader scope of medical care. It aims to understand diseases by discerning the uniqueness of a patient’s biological, psychological, social, comorbidities, etc., concerns to obtain insights regarding what impedes their recovery.
Applying the biopsychosocial model stresses that the correlation of the biological, psychological, and social factors influence a patient’s health and illness. Manifestation of diseases, especially chronic symptoms, may be complex to treat without addressing issues outside bodily indications. Additionally, the model provides a more holistic perspective on someone’s health problems.
As a result, any medical treatment or proceedings for elderly patients requires careful consideration, including ensuring that the patient is always part of the decision-making process. Additionally, care providers should assume that they can make medical decisions for themselves, including ones that may be an ethical dilemma, unless there is clinical evidence that they are mentally deficient.
Understanding Elderly Behavior and Condition
When caring for the elderly, understanding the conditions and behavior unique to them, free of any prejudices and assumptions, is the most critical aspect a care provider can do. Recognizing an elderly patient’s physical, social, mental, and emotional needs allows for effective care and positive outcomes.
As is common throughout one’s lifespan, an elderly’s personality can change over time. These changes may have stemmed from their life experiences, social factors, or grievances affecting them mentally and emotionally. Moreover, it can also mean that an underlying health issue causes these changes.
Common age-related diagnoses of elderlies, like any cognitive impairment (e.g., dementia, delirium, heart conditions, depression, etc.) and disabilities (e.g., sight impairment, hearing loss, arthritis, injuries, etc.), contribute to a geriatric patient’s behavior. Thus, it’s vital to know what is considered normal in these circumstances of behavioral changes to be able to provide care that meets their needs.
Geriatric Care Tips
When caring for elderly patients, knowing their unique conditions, like dealing with the intricacies of their behavioral changes, can be difficult. Thus, following these essential tips goes a long way for an elderly patient’s life.
Communication and Connection
Building a good and trusting relationship with elderly patients is essential in providing geriatric care to them. Communicating can effectively provide insights into their physical and psychological well-being. In addition, connecting to them through their joys and grief builds a rapport. Finally, showing sincere empathy toward their feelings, concerns, and sentiments makes for a genuine nurse-patient connection.
Patience
When caring for the elderly, care providers must have patience with them. Sometimes, especially for patients with hearing impairment, one must repeat themselves several times for patients to fully understand them. So, keeping a level head and exercising patience maintains a rational mind when dealing with the elderly and catering to their needs effectively.
Compassion
Along with patience, compassion shouldn’t be out of the question. Providing geriatric care with patience requires compassion for the elderly regardless of their situations. Common challenges care providers face when caring for the elderly, like forgetfulness, apathy, behavioral changes, etc., can be discouraging.
However, having empathy for them and recognizing that these circumstances are not inherently the patient’s fault is very helpful for building a sincere nurse-patient relationship.
Ensure Comfort
Always keeping an elderly’s comfort is a priority. Care providers must know what works best for their patients to establish maximum comfort. This step includes asking the elderly about their needs and letting them identify concerns. In addition, offering them decision-making choices whenever possible, but in which they can still maintain their sense of independence.
Furthermore, ensuring and maintaining a comfortable environment for geriatric patients also helps diminish possible stressors.
Care with Dignity and Respect
Care providers must remember that the elderly have had a lifetime of unique experiences and deserve to be cared for with respect and dignity. Acknowledging and allowing them to carry out tasks and make decisions independently, given they still can, is one way of showing them respect.
Summing up
Providing care for geriatric patients requires patience and consideration as caring for children. Care providers must know how to handle the elderly with unique predisposing factors affecting their health and well-being. A patient-centered approach to providing them with the care they need allows for a much deeper understanding of their condition.
Ultimately, despite the challenges that come with caring for geriatric patients, there are ways in which one can achieve positive experiences and outcomes.
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