Providing Long-Distance

Care Management Yourself

       Ernest, a retired salesman, lives in New Jersey on a fixed income. He has been providing care for his wife, Frances, who has a mild case of Parkinson's disease. His parents retired to Naples many years ago, where they purchased a mobile home. They, too, lived on a fixed income. Five years ago, Ernest's mother died, and despite his pleas for his father, Jimmy, to come back to New Jersey to live, he refused the offer. Jimmy did not want to leave his modest home, his friends, or his church.

       Several weeks ago, Ernest received an alarming call from Jimmy's next door neighbor, who had been helping him by dropping off groceries on a weekly basis. The neighbor said that it had been some time since he had been inside Jimmy's home, and on that particular day, he entered the home to find it in terrible shape. He said there was an unpleasant odor, which he assumed was caused by an air conditioning problem, and he noticed stacks of unopened mail lying on the dining room table. Jimmy clearly was not taking care of himself, but he denied that he was experiencing any problems.

       The neighbor made it clear to Ernest that other than helping to resolve the air conditioning problem, he did not want to be involved in providing additional assistance to Jimmy. He suggested that Ernest take immediate steps to place his father in a nursing home, hire a home health service, or bring him back to New Jersey to live. Realizing that neither he nor his dad could afford the costs of on-going home health services, and that nursing home care would wipe out what little savings his father had, Ernest now is spending a considerable amount of time and money trying to keep an already bad situation from becoming worse.

       Even though Ernest wants to, he is afraid to ask his father to move back to New Jersey, where he could provide care.

       Becoming a provider and manager of care is not an easy task, particularly when the distance between you and your loved one is great. Whether or not finances are of great concern, it should be noted that the government does provide a host of programs and services to older people with limited incomes and, in some cases, limited assets.  Competition for these services is great, and many programs and services have long waiting lists.

       Unfortunately, a person's ability to receive many of the entitlements and other required services is directly related to the persistence of the caregiver and the intensity of the advocacy efforts required.

  Jack M. Rosenkranz, P.A.