Interior Design Peoria
A Nursing Home Care For Seniors
Lauren is up at 5 a.m. to get her workout in and grab a quick breakfast before getting the kids off to school and heading to her 9-5 job at the bank. After work, she feeds the kids dinner, drops them off at sport’s practice and heads to her 80-year-old mother’s home to pick up a grocery shopping list, take out the trash, run a load of laundry, do the dishes, give her mother medicine and bring leftovers from dinner. By the time she gets back home, it’s 10 p.m. and she’s got to shower and chat with her husband for a few minutes just to unwind. She’ll be lucky to get six hours of sleep before doing it all over again. No matter how much we love our parents, elder care is a tough job, especially when life is as busy as it is. Luckily, most communities have something called home care aides now to help alleviate some of the household chores and errands, freeing up more of our time just to visit with our elderly loved ones.
Home care for seniors is becoming increasingly more popular as families prefer to keep their loved ones in the comfort of their own homes as long as possible. Elderly caregiver Amanda Rowry works for home health care agency Addus in Peoria, Illinois. This 30-year-old is perpetually busy, but she admits, “It has given me the sense of fulfillment that I lacked.” Six days a week Amanda’s up and out the door at 7:30 a.m., driving 30 minutes to visit 86-year-old Clara Betts, who is diabetic, nearly blind, arthritic and wheelchair-bound. By 10 a.m., Amanda has finished two loads of laundry, cooked breakfast, washed dishes, made the bed, applied lotion to Clara’s skin, helped her dress, taken out the garbage and brought in the mail. By the end of the day, she’ll have been to three people’s homes. On her one day off, she cares for her boyfriend with cancer and rides with a women’s motorcycle club.
The life of a home care worker is hardly glamorous. Since most workers are paid by agencies that rely on state government funding, there is sometimes difficulty paying employees. As a result, wages remain low ($9.35 to $9.50/hour) and it’s getting harder and harder to find home care workers who have reliable transportation, clean backgrounds and open schedules. If they could work 40 hours/week, they’d be bringing in less than $20,000 annually, but most workers only have part-time work because many of the previous programs have been cut due to economic crisis budget shortages. Despite the financial hardships in recent years, the demand for home health assistants is still high. Amanda Rowry’s company, Addus, brought in $800 million this year, up from $320 million in 2003, with 90% of that money going to the wages of the home aides themselves.
Many people like Clara Betts would otherwise be in nursing homes if it weren’t for home care workers like Amanda. The clients say the quality of care they receive at home often surpasses their expectations, while easing their loneliness. Often times, it’s the little things that make such a big difference in the lives of the elderly clients. Sure, they get to retain their independence, live in their own homes and have a little help with the overwhelming amount of chores. But, Clara says, “It makes a big difference, helps me all the rest of the day.”
Kenny Leichester is a foremost expert in the interior design industry specializing in the outdoor or patio settings using outdoor patio furniture, patio umbrellas, outdoor cushions, patio heaters, patio lighting and so on to create exquisitely beautiful layout. His work on outdoor patio furniture cushions designs and so on are widely distributed and is a regular contributor to PatioShoppers.com.
Peoria IL Home Staging