Your senior’s fall risks are an important thing for each of you to understand. Your elderly family member’s risk of falling depend on a lot of different variables that can change as things like her health also change. Once a person falls, they’re twice as like to fall again according to the Centers for Disease Control. By working diligently to avoid that first fall, you can hopefully avoid any others, too.
Your Senior Has a Specific Set of Risk Factors
Every individual person has their own set of risk factors for falling. Your senior may have health issues that leave her dizzy, wobbly, or in some other respect more liable to fall. Some of the medications that she takes to deal with chronic health issues may also create greater risk, too. All of these different factors combine to create a unique set of risk factors for your senior. Her doctor can help you to get as full a list of these as possible.
Falls Are Avoidable
It’s important to remember that for the most part, falls are avoidable. Especially as you and your senior come to understand the unique risk factors she’s facing you’re going to be better prepared to do what you can to minimize the likelihood of a fall. Coming to this realization can help your elderly family member to avoid feeling fatalistic about falling, particularly if she just expects that she’s going to fall at some point.
Focusing on Safety Can Resolve Many Fall Concerns
One of the biggest things you can do to reduce fall risk for your elderly family member is to keep an eye on safety at all times. Taking care of home maintenance on a regular basis is incredibly helpful, especially if there are necessary repairs that have been put off. Getting some extra help for your elderly family member on a daily basis can also help. Elderly care providers make a lot of tasks easier for your senior, especially if those tasks have become more challenging and might result in injury if she tries them on her own.
Lifestyle Changes Can Also Impact Fall Risk
But there are other things your senior can do, too. Following her doctor’s orders about health issues can ensure that she’s not as likely to fall as a result. Starting an exercise routine can help to improve your elderly family member’s balance, strength, and flexibility. Eating regularly and choosing foods that are high in nutritional value can ensure that blood sugar levels remain stable. These changes may seem small, but they can offer big results.
The idea of falling is definitely frightening, but you and your senior can work together to put a plan for avoiding as many risks as possible.
If you or an aging loved-one are considering elderly care in Aurora, CO, please contact the caring staff at SYNERGY HomeCare today. Call us at (303) 756-9322.