Assisted living, also known as residential care settings or personal care homes, can be the answer to your loved one’s daily struggles. These establishments offer around-the-clock long-term care for their every need while providing them with continual social interaction and a sense of community to improve mental well being.
Deciding When Is the Right Time
Assisted living might not be an easy choice to make for your loved one, but as you begin to witness increasing signs of daily life getting harder for them to manage, the only question left to ask yourself might be when?
Many tasks that we are all programmed to complete almost unconsciously, such as bathing, cooking, and getting dressed, all prove to become more difficult to accomplish as we age. Without these meaningful tasks being done, aspects of life begin to deteriorate, including personal hygiene, diet, and social interaction. If you have detected signs such as these in a loved one, then deciding to settle them into an assisted living environment could certainly benefit them in their later years.
Assisted Living Vs Nursing Home
Choosing an assisted living facility over a nursing home can make the transition to moving away from home easier for your loved one. This is since assisted living care can offer a more social and home-like setting where your loved one can continue living an independent lifestyle, mimicking their current home setting.
Not only might your loved one feel more at home in such a facility, but they will also have greater access to common areas, including outdoor spaces, along with the opportunity to partake in an extensive range of recreational activities. This will help to boost their mental and physical well being, while being surrounded by a team of staff who treat them just like family.
The Benefits of Keeping Mentally Engaged and Physically Active
There is a range of benefits to keeping mentally engaged and physically active during our lifetimes but even more so as we age. Research has proven that the addition of physical exercise into daily life can reduce the risk of falling and fracturing bones, while also helping to prevent the risk of death due to coronary heart disease and diabetes. Whilst vigorous exercise may increase the risk of injury, it is recommended that short intervals of moderate activity, such as walking or stair walking, are the key to keeping our loved ones physically healthy.
Assisted living establishments such as Prairie Hills Senior Living, lie a heavy focus on developing new activities to reap these benefits for all their live-in, ‘family’ members. Here, the staff can assist with daily activities to instill confidence in our elderly community, to continue being active and doing so safely, and happily.
No matter if you have concluded about when the right time will be or not, you may now be able to make a more informed decision as to whether the choice to move your loved one into an assisted living facility is the right one for you and your family.
