Working with a geriatric-care manager

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When you're exploring a foreign country, a guide who knows the terrain well can help immensely. That's just as true when entering the foreign territory of caregiving. Here, a geriatric-care manager can provide invaluable assistance for individuals and families facing challenging care decisions.

Geriatric-care managers come from diverse backgrounds, from nursing and social work to gerontology. These professionals can help navigate the tangles of family dynamics, round up medical care and necessary services, keep medical personnel on the same page, and cut through the baffling red tape of private businesses and government bureaucracies.

Get your copy of Caregiver's Handbook

Close to 49 million informal or family caregivers offer assistance of all sorts to adults in America. Their efforts are vital to the lives of people struggling with illness, disability, or the changes that often accompany aging. This report will assist you in meeting the needs of the person you care for while attending to your own. It includes financial, legal, and medical information that’s vital to caregivers, as well as a special section devoted to caring for yourself as you navigate caregiving challenges.

Some of the tasks geriatric-care managers routinely undertake include:

evaluating needs
connecting people to helpful services, senior housing, and long-term care facilities
bringing families together to discuss options supportively
hiring and monitoring home care personnel
communicating with specialists, hospital and home care staff, and family members to coordinate care
alerting families to financial, medical, or legal problems and suggesting ways to circumvent difficulties
helping with a move to assisted living, a nursing home, an Alzheimer's care unit, or other facilities.

Some geriatric-care specialists focus on assisting older people. Others have expertise coordinating care and services for people of all ages with disabilities or debilitating illnesses.

Although working with a geriatric-care manager may be costly, such expertise can often save money and regrets, especially if you are scrambling to arrange care from afar. The cost of a geriatric-care manager is usually borne by the client or family, rarely by long-term care insurance. If you plan to work with a geriatric-care manager, be sure to get a written agreement outlining the scope of services offered and costs. This document can also help you decide which tasks, if any, might be undertaken by family and friends to save money.

To learn more about geriatric-care managers, or to locate a geriatric-care manager, contact the National Association of Professional Geriatric Care Managers at 520-881-8008 or www.caremanager.org.

For more on developing plans and effective strategies for the hard work of caregiving, buyCaregiver's Handbook, a Special Health Report from Harvard Medical School.