The Complete Eldercare Planner: Where to Start, Which Questions to Ask, and How to Find Help

An Excellent Resource

We included this book in our list of recommended resources for caregivers at our end-of-life seminar offered by my church to our congregation and the community. I wish I had had such a book during the nine years I was a caregiver for my mother-in-law.

Timeless Advice

As the host of the 'Coping with Caregiving' radio show, I am constantly sent books from authors interested in being on my show. This is still one of the best and a staple you should have in your library if you are a caregiver or think it is just about to befall you.

-Jacqueline Marcell, Author 'Elder Rage', International Speaker on Eldercare & Alzheimer's, Host 'Coping With Caregiving' Internet Radio Show at wsRadio

Review of the Complete Eldercare Planner

Many complicated issues are addressed in Joy Loverde¿s book The Complete Eldercare Planner ¿ second edition. As a nurse practitioner who works with older adults, I often recommend this book to patients and families to aide them in tackling many of the tough issues with aging. Checklists, step-by-step action plans, tips on communication are just some of the valuable resources in aiding elders and families through many of the tough aspects of the aging process. The record keeping forms in chapter 14 are extremely valuable resources as they allow the older adult to record valuable information. During stressful events it is often difficult to remember critical information and having a written record is vital. I have worked as a geriatric nurse practitioner for a number of years and extracting information from patients is one of my most challenging jobs. Keeping records such as these are so valuable that I wrote my own book about the importance of medical record keeping, Health Care Responsibility: The Older Adult¿s Guide to Surviving the Health Care System. Ray Lengel, Certified Nurse Practitioner, Author Health Care Responsibility: The Older Adult¿s Guide to Surviving the Health Care System.

Overwhelming Help in a crisis time of need

Recently I found myself along with 3 other siblings and spouses thrust into new uncharted waters in a totally new season of our lives. Suddenly and without any training we were and continue to this day having to take care of my aging parents. I for one will freely admit that as a child I was never trained, prepared, nor exceptionally gifted to undertake such a task. It is just not the type of thing that you can ever really get to a line and say ready...set...go...and do it very well. Elderly health care in 2005 does not always afford us the luxury of any long preparation either emotionally or financially. Suddenly unmercifully and usually without warning you hear over the phone in the midst of a busy American routine those words you dread. It's Cancer, a stroke, or replacement surgery, just minor or major operations which means weeks of homecare and hospitalization's, etc., You are suddenly no longer swinging a few bats warming up in the on deck circle there in safety at a bit of distance. But you find yourself thrust into the batters box. You are no longer the stand by just in case fill in player who dressed for the game just in case you would or might be needed. But suddenly with a phone call, you find yourself thrust without any prior warning into the batters box. You are to take charge with 3 others voices and votes, your parents primary healthcare. Now, if you call a frantic call for 'HELP' in the middle of the night when just the week before things were okay a warning, well then, you're doing better than we were. You find yourself suddenly up at the plate with bases loaded, two outs, bottom of the ninth your teams behind 3 runs. To top it off you're facing a 94mph fastball pitcher who also throws a mean slider called the reality of life. You have never been good at hitting these kinds of pitches. Much less being the homerun hitter the team needs at this moment and are all looking to you now for. Then you hear through your wife there is a book available on just such a thing. It allows you to calmly and logically check out all of your options. It tells you in simple language just how you go about walking through this difficult mine field you've been thrust into without training or any real prior warning. It tells you how to do this without losing your mind, your family unity, and most of all your parents dignity. I found myself literally reading the pages of Joy's, 'Elder Care' wonderful 'How TO' book on the plane going headed to Florida. I was then going there for my Dad's 80th B-day party as well as a visit to help out for 10 days at my elderly parents. Little did I know then, that I would see those 10 days turn suddenly into 46 long and hectic days I ended up spending there. Little did I realize as I paged through this how to book on Elderly Care that it would be like a daily Bible to me. I was literally reading a chapter ahead of the events as they unfolded in the next days. It was giving me the answers to question I had not yet asked, but found myself doing so in the next days to follow. As a former Eagle Scout, USMC SGT., Police Officer, Business owner, 20 years as a Lay Minister and being Happily Married to the same woman for over 26 years now, I'd received lots and lots of great training. Even you will have to admit that this background covers a lot of diversified and really good training. But nothing, absolutely nothing, but my Faith prepared me emotionally, physically, or all of us financially for the events that would suddenly and totally unwelcomed show up in the middle of the night. They just seem to attack you without ceasing on these issues when it's 'Your Mom or Dad.' Thank you Joy, for the time it must have taken you and the wealth of information this book contains. I personally know that it was truly a Godsend at a time of crisis in our lives. It still today continues to guide us along these slippery slopes. But because of this well timed work of Mercy and Grace, we have maintained as

Excellent professional resource

I work for an area agency on aging in Oregon and do some work in our Title IIIE family caregiver support program. Unfortunately, in these shaky economic times, the State is on the verge of cutting a large number of our Medicaid clients from nursing home and community based programs -- and we are expecting much more of the burden of caring for the elderly falling to families than is even now the case -- so the more resources that can be made available to them, the better. Joy, keep up the good work! I also appreciated the chapter on caring for difficult parents (I've got two of them, ages 81 and 90, living in a mobile home park in Peoria AZ) -- in fact I lent the book to my sister who lives in Virginia and she found it very helpful during a trying time she had with them last spring.

Complete Eldercare Planner: Where to Start, Which Questions to Ask, and How to Find Help

Reviewer: Danny from Naples, Florida I never thought my family would get this crazy. My sister and I would fight all the time over what to do with mom. We didn't know what to do with her. This book was an incredible help. It told us what to expect and what to do step by step. Everything is peaceful for now. Don't wait. Get this book today.

Complete Eldercare Planner: Where to Start, Which Questions to Ask, and How to Find Help

Patrick Stinson, Executive Director of the Employee Management Association (WWW.ESMASSN.ORG) Employers are beginning to understand that they incur eldercare-related costs in terms of employee lost work time, higher use of health benefits, impaired productivity, unplanned absences, telephone costs, and employee turnover rate. This book is also an indispensable guide for employee benefits. When The Complete Eldercare Planner is in the hands of the employee, everyone benefits.

When you plan you have choices

This is a book based on the principles of good planning and that it is better to be proactive than reactive. 'When I plan, I have choices,' the author states. And she gives the reader voluminous choices. This is a book filled with forms and action steps, low-cost and free resources and explanatory narrative. It will get you to where you need to be to be an effective care planner and caregiver. Topics include where to start, how to tell when your elder needs help, emergency preparedness, financial and legal matters, housing, long-distance caregiving, transportation, medical concerns, death and dying, and resources. This is a highly accessible and well thought-out workbook. For example, the author has taken the highly complex issue of 'Money Matters' and divided it into workable plans. The first deals with the business side of cargiving and lists the things you need to calculate expenses; part two helps you to figure out if you can afford elder care; and the third describes who pays for what. The fourth plan is asking for help with time and money, listing the kinds of resources you might need help with (home maintenance, cooking, exercise, heavy lifting). The chapter then goes on to plans for helping your loved one plan for financial fitness, with workbook forms for determining his or her current financial state (medical costs, income, expenses, insurance policies, travel costs, and financial advisors). With this material laid out so clearly, the tasks of caregiving do not feel so foreboding. This book takes the fear out of the unknown and makes caregiving manageable from the start. The 'Documents Locator' at the end -- the whole list of legal, personal, medical documents you might need -- is worth the price of admission alone.

No text was provided for this review.

No text was provided for this review.