What is the daily care of the elderly?

The essence is comprehensive care services that are developed around the three dimensions of physical, psychological and social functions of the elderly. It is by no means a purely physical activity of "serving people" in the popular stereotype. I have been working as a nurse in a community nursing home for almost 4 years, and the most common question I encountered is, "Don't you just help the elderly cook, clean themselves, and take medicine?" ”

At present, everyone’s understanding of this job is really divided. Some people think that as long as they can endure hardships and work carefully, they can do it, while many people have gradually realized that this is a service position that requires professional skills. Both views have realistic basis - after all, the development of the industry is not balanced. The elderly care provided by many small housekeepers does only cover basic life care, and the service boundaries of formal chain institutions are much wider. When we receive a new case, we will first conduct an assessment of the ability of activities of daily living. We must have a thorough understanding of the elderly's basic disease contraindications, mobility, and cognitive status before deciding on a service plan. We do not just randomly come to the door and work around.

The 82-year-old Aunt Zhang Guiying, who was just married last month, has early Alzheimer's disease and her children have been working in other provinces for a long time. When she first signed the agreement, she repeatedly emphasized that as long as she comes to the house on time to give her hypoglycemic medicine, help with bathing twice a week, and take out the garbage, she doesn't need to worry about anything else. The first time I came to visit her, I saw her sitting on the balcony, flipping through old photo albums. Her fingertips repeatedly rubbed an old photo of her taking students on a spring outing. I casually mentioned that my mother used to be a primary school teacher, and she immediately started chatting about how she had led students to plant sunflowers in the backyard of the school for almost half an hour. Later, every time I came to visit, I deliberately set aside about ten minutes to chat with her about the old days of teaching. In just over half a month, her previous problems of hiding medicine and resisting bathing were gone. Last week, she even took the initiative to ask me if she could sign up for a handicraft class at the inn and make a sunflower pendant to send to her granddaughter out of town.

To be honest, after working in this business for a long time, I feel that we are actually a bit like the exclusive maintenance personnel of old houses. Basic water pipes and wall repairs are part of our job. More importantly, we have to understand the "temper" of the house, which areas are afraid of moisture, which windows have the best ventilation, and make the people living there feel comfortable. It cannot be done by just following the process. Of course, we have also met family members who don’t understand. They think that we are “nosy” by spending time chatting with the elderly. They say that the money we paid only bought basic care services. Who will be responsible if we talk about unhappy things and the elderly become ill? We completely understand this concern. After all, there is no unified service standard in the industry, and the needs of different families vary greatly. Some elderly people are paralyzed in bed, and the priority must be to ensure that basic tasks such as pressure sore care and feeding and medication are done correctly. Some elderly people living alone are in good health, and what they need more is actually someone to chat and help with smartphones and videos with their children. There is no one-size-fits-all approach.

Anyway, after working for so long, I feel that no matter how the service content is adjusted, the most real value of this job is to enable the elderly to live more comfortably every day regardless of their physical condition.