It’s time to appoint a geriatric care manager for your loved ones

Prashanth Reddy, Founder & Director, Anvayaa Kin Care, has a view that due to the change in lifestyle, old people are now inclined towards elderly care and it provides multiple benefits such as home care, nursing care and others

There is a sharp increase in the aging population worldwide. All societies in the world are in the midst of this longevity revolution, though at various phases. It is estimated that one in six of humanity will be over the age of 65 by 2050, a sharp rise from one in 11 in 2019. India too is experiencing growth in the proportion of older persons as South-Eastern Asia is witnessing one of the sharp growth. According to a UN study, about 62 per cent of the elderly in India lack long-term, palliative care.

Indeed, elderly people in India often face problems like loneliness, restricted mobility, disability, financial instability and lack of access to the right care. What compounds this problem is the ever-increasing generation gap and the fast and demanding lifestyle of young people, leaving a large number of older people to struggle for independence. Besides, we are also witnessing increasing demand for quality life by senior citizens, positive healthcare policies, technological advances and rising chronic illness, among the older populations. Due to the change in lifestyle, old people are now inclined towards elderly care and it provides multiple benefits such as home care, nursing care and others.

When older adults no longer care for them, it’s usually up to their family members to take over the responsibility. Families often get anxious and ask, “What do we do? How do we handle this? Yet, managing the care of an aging  loved one in today’s fast-paced life is often a full-time job, especially if family members live far away, or if the elderly are suffering from some chronic ailments, they requires frequent doctor visits and need assistance at home – which may be in another town. This is where the geriatric care manager could be extremely helpful in taking the stress off family caregivers, helping solve problems and ensuring that our loved one is getting the best care possible.

The aging life care manager is also known as a geriatric care manager, a type of elder care professional trained to jump into these challenging situations and offer solutions, guidance, and hands-on management. It is not unusual for adult children to engage a professional help when things get complicated with a new diagnosis. As caregivers and families cope with the overwhelming stress of caring for a loved one, a Geriatric Care Manager can help families who are caring for older relatives and ensure family-like care for the elderly. Such professionals have experience in a range of services driving advocacy for the elderly including social work, psychology, nursing, gerontology and trained to assess, plan, coordinate, monitor and provide services for the elderly and their families.

A geriatric care manager is more like a consultant stabilising the needs of elderly people. The job involves evaluation of a family’s situation, assessing the person’s condition and lifestyle, looking at the available resources and coming up with the appropriate counsel to that family. Geriatric care managers may accompany older adults to doctor appointments and serve as a liaison between the family, patient and health care team. They are well-versed in explaining the complex medical terms to the family in a simple manner.

These professionals are not just experts in planning, but also in coordinating the care of the elderly to improve their quality of life and to maintain their independence. They are trained to oversee and organise the daily lives of the elderly, including doing a safety check in the home, bill payments, assessing the financial circumstances and hiring someone to do bedside care and do some paperwork, etc. They can manage medical care, including getting to doctor’s appointments, accompanying them to doctor, diagnostics, etc. as needed, communicating with all the doctors and ensuring timely medication.

A case in point is India’s leading, Artificial-Intelligence (AI) enabled, holistic one-stop senior care provider which has already provided elder care to about 1,000 families.

The tech-enabled, personalised, senior care platform specialises in comprehensive solutions on quality medicare and emergency eldercare. What makes it special is a holistic, human-centric, personalised senior care solutions, providing healthcare assistance, emergency care, socialisation assistance, daily needs assistance and payment management. An app-based service exclusively designed for the senior citizens allows one to not only keep a tab on the well-being of their loved ones past their prime, but also help them with dedicated support staff who can offer round-the-clock service. Further, the innovations include IoT and AI-driven platform to ensure proactive care and exclusive e-commerce site for elderly.

While the fact is none can replace the sons and daughters of the elders, geriatric care managers can definitely fill that gap by giving that emotional care and support for the elderly, offering certainty for their family while they are away – the peace of mind that comes from learning that our loved one is properly taken care. It is high time we need to harness their value.