The Complete Guide to Elderly Care: Exploring What Different Professionals Offer in Patient Care

The type of care, senior citizens access often influences every aspect of their lives. When a person can no longer take care of their own basic necessities, their quality of life is the direct result of other people’s actions. Friends. Family members. And— when they are lucky— the assistance of a trained medical professional.

On the employment end, these careers offer unique and rewarding work. In this article, we take a look at all aspects of elder care. Read to learn more about how senior citizens receive treatment and what kind of professionals provide it.

When Does “Elder” Care Begin?

People don’t exactly age out of their general practitioner’s services. Elder care generally begins when someone stops being able to take care of themselves and reaches a physical status that will never improve.

They are not dying, or do not have to be anyway, but they:

• Are no longer benefiting from preventative care, and

• They can’t take care of themselves the way they used to.

To this former point, elder healthcare professionals will work to maximize their patient’s quality of life. To the latter point, they might also— particularly when working in the home setting— help them with basic tasks around the house.

Home Healthcare Providers

Not everyone realizes that many— possibly even the majority of— healthcare workers who go directly into elderly patient’s homes are not registered nurses. In fact, many healthcare workers are basically medical technicians. They are trained on how to assist with medication. Take vitals and perform basic but important routine healthcare checkups.

Home healthcare providers will also assist their patients with hygienic concerns where applicable. Patients who qualify for this kind of care usually need help with many or most aspects of their routine.

Often they will also help the patient with minor quality of life tasks around the house. This could include light cleaning, meal prep, or even small errands.

Becoming a home, healthcare worker generally requires a certification from an associate's degree program. You can accomplish these online or at most community colleges.

In certain cases, the base competencies that you begin in an associate's program can be scaled into a nursing certification. If you are interested in that angle of home health work, make sure you speak with the school guidance counselor to ensure that the credits will align with those required by a four-year program.

Gerontology Nursing

Gerontology care begins when a patient transitions out of the realm of health advice that can be provided by a general practitioner. The minimum age for gerontology care is generally 65, though most patients are older.

People who fall into this category are not necessarily dying, but they also do not have any reasonable expectation of improving either. Preventative medicine is no longer a focus. Gerontology nurses focus on maximizing the quality of life.

Often they do this while working directly in the patient’s home. This type of care can overlap with hospice care. However, it is important to distinguish the two. A person could feasibly survive for years under the care of a gerontology, nurse. Often they do not, but it is possible.

In many cases, they are suffering from cognitive decline. Dementia. Alzheimer’s. Other conditions that can be treated, but never cured.

Gerontology nurses have the opportunity to improve their patient’s lives, but they also generally establish long-term relationships with the people that they treat.

While many people appreciate this aspect of the work it also makes the job difficult. Gerontology nurses inevitably watch people they come to care about suffer and die.

Granted, misery and death are constant aspects of healthcare work. They just aren’t always a guarantee in the same way they are with gerontology care.

To become a gerontology nurse, you often have to get a graduate degree and become a nurse practitioner.

This will typically take around three years to accomplish. It is a difficult process, but for the right person, the resulting career can be extremely rewarding.

Mental Healthcare

There is an increasingly high emphasis on connecting senior citizens with high-quality mental healthcare services. Even elderly patients who are reasonably healthy often experience a wide range of anxieties and other emotions. Perhaps they have a significant number of friends and family members.

Perhaps they are struggling with their own mortality or even just their diminishing autonomy.

It isn’t easy getting older. Elderly-specific psychiatric services can help make the transition into old age easier.

Psychiatric nurse practitioners can work with patients to identify difficult emotions. They can even write prescriptions for certain conditions.

Like all nurse practitioner positions, you will need to go to graduate school to get this job. That is a big commitment. The benefit is that you will have the opportunity to specialize in an aspect of healthcare that you are passionate about.

Is also worth noting that nurse practitioners generally earn six-figure salaries and have higher degrees of autonomy than standard RNs.

Conclusion

Unfortunately, senior health services are not always as robust or accessible as they should be. The cost of at-home care can be extremely prohibitive. Even very low-end live-in senior centers are extremely expensive. There are agencies and public assistant programs, but they are unreliable and often low quality.

Though the system may feel hopeless healthcare workers make a positive contribution every single day. If you are interested in brightening the life of a senior citizen who requires healthcare assistance, consider a job administering healthcare for advanced-aged patients. The situations you encounter on the job are severe, but the work will allow you to make a huge difference in the lives you touch.

Interested in getting started? There are many flexible learning options, from traditional classroom instruction, to fully certified online programs. There are now more ways than ever to become a healthcare worker.