Chances are, you know someone with dementia. Whether you're the caregiver, or a friend of the family, or a friend of the patient, this episode is for you. You're going to learn about some resources that you did not even know existed that can help you keep the home safe, keep the patient safe, or just minister to your friends. , You're listening to Healthy Looks Great On You, a lifestyle medicine podcast. I'm your host, Dr. Vickie Petz Kasper. For two decades, I practiced as a board certified obstetrician gynecologist, navigating the intricate world of women's health. But life took an unexpected turn when my own health faltered. Emerging on the other side, I discovered the transformative power of lifestyle medicine. And now I'm on a mission to share its incredible benefits with you. So buckle up because we're going on a journey to our own mini medical school. Where you'll learn how lifestyle medicine can help prevent, treat, and sometimes even reverse disease. This is episode 113, the Heartbreak of Caring for Someone with Dementia. And today I have a very, very special guest. My guest today is Haley Buller. Haley lives in Illinois where she is an occupational therapist one of the areas that she specializes in is helping with patients who have dementia. Welcome, Haley. I'm so glad you're here with me today. I can't wait to talk about caring for Alzheimer's patients and also caring for the caregiver. I think that's something you have quite a passion for. Thanks for having me today. , yes, I am an occupational therapist, and I work in outpatient neuro. I, help run the outpatient portion of our dementia program here at our hospital. That's great. So tell me exactly what you do if someone has dementia and they come to your clinic. You're doing an evaluation to make sure that they're safe in the home and that they can age in place, right? Yes. So our primary goal is to keep them at home as long as possible and to keep them as independent as possible. So we do an assessment as an OT. I'm mainly looking at their daily activities. Can they bathe, dress, take care of themselves at home, , function within their home and then making their home. a safe environment. We also initially will always do a caregiver assessment. It's a caregiver burnout assessment to see how the caregiver is doing in their own life with dealing with caring for the patient. So I think that is super important, and honestly, there is a void in that space. Caregivers are burned out. It's a lonely disease, isolating, and really just heartbreaking. So first of all, talk about what it looks like when people are burned out, and also what you can do about it, or even how you can prevent it. So the main thing that I hear is loneliness, especially if the caregiver is caring for someone who is their spouse, because that's been their partner. They've been living life together for a long time, and then all of a sudden that person is still there, but who they are is gone. So a lot of caregivers are experiencing a deep loneliness because of this void that they have. That was once their partner. A lot of times their friends isolate them as well, and that's always unintentional, but we see people not being invited to things because it's a lot of work to get out of the house or people stop coming over because maybe they don't know what to say. That's a really good point and I think it's important for us to talk about what friends can do. And you know, I think traditionally what we do is we take a meal, but we don't stay and eat. Or we send a card, but we don't have a conversation. And so there are multiple opportunities for people to minister to their friends who are dealing with this by just being there for them. Not calling and saying, Hey, if there's anything I can ever do, give me a call, but truly continuing to do life with them. Yes. So there are two different approaches to look at this. And one is being there with them in the home. So just going over, this is so important for the patient as well, that you can listen to their stories, even if those stories aren't making sense, just being in their world, giving them, , some friendship and some companionship that also may allow the caregiver to have some time to themselves, some time to not listen to those stories that they've heard several times. , but just to give a little reprieve. The other thing you can do is to take them out. So if they have someone else who can give them an hour off, ask them to go to lunch, or like you said, take lunch and then also stay. So you brought up the stories and living in their world. One time I heard someone say, fall with them. Don't try to prevent them from falling, but fall with them. Because I think the tendency is to sort of correct when someone tells something that's not true, or if they're trying to tell a story that's really not plausible. And you want to say, no, no, you're at home, ...
