Day to Day Care Strategies

Here are some strategies to make the day go a little easier while caring for your family member at home:

Guidelines for Helping with Daily Self-care Tasks

• Simplify and clarify the task. Clothing garments with simple fasteners or a permed hairstyle may go far in enabling the person to complete a task independently. Clarify the task with environmental cues such as a comb and brush set out by the makeup mirror.
• Reduce distractions such as background noise, clutter, or similarly colored toilet and dressing stool covers.
• Keep a regular routine. A regular routine makes life more predictable. It reduces confusion, improves cooperation, and increases your parent's ability to do their own self-care.
• Be flexible and patient. It is important to remain flexible and patient because the first attempt at getting a task done often will not work. Also, remember to not take refusals personally?the person with Alzheimer's disease cannot help his/her behavior.
• Use good communication techniques. Use simple, short phrases and add gestures and visual cues to help demonstrate what you mean.

Techniques for Helping

• Break the task into steps that are small enough to match the person's abilities. For example, give him/her a reminder before each step: "put toothpaste on the toothbrush", "rinse your mouth", and "dry off your mouth".
• Demonstrate the step. For example, when you say "wipe your mouth" you can wipe your own mouth with a towel or tissue.
• Help begin the action. Even when you demonstrate a step, the person may still not be sure what to do. You can help by beginning the action until he/she remembers what to do. Gently guide his/her hand to the toothbrush and squeeze the toothpaste, for example.
• Give the person time to finish each step. Rushing a person with Alzheimer's disease usually will only increase confusion, embarrassment, and resistance. If you don't have time, wait until later to do the task. If you don't have patience, ask another family member to relieve you.

Responding to Resistance

• Pay attention to the cues.Cues such as facial grimace, pouting, anger, crying, or anxiety can warn you that your approach is not working and can help you prevent more serious problems.
• Respond to the emotional communication. Don't argue logically, neither of you will win. Work to keep a positive emotional atmosphere. Remember, your parent cannot be reasoned with and it's not his/her fault.
• Redirect the person's attention to a more pleasant topic, activity, or object.
• Try again later with a different approach. Remember it is not essential that personal care activities always be done when planned. They can be done later, or sometimes abandoned.