Home Healthcare and Nursing with Joe Wicker & Dr. David Bernstein

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It's available widely and we think there's some great information for you. Michael Watkins is the principal of the Tampa Bay Advisory. This is his kind of dream, his, his dream team concept, his idea for helping those as we age. And Michael, I'm gonna let you discuss a little bit about how you came up with the idea and how you brought this panel of experts.

Yeah, so it's, it has a lot to do with networking in the industry years of experience that type of thing. And so in my space, what I do is I help people prepare for successful retirement. and there's probably, you know, the most people think, oh, taxes or a stock market crash mm-hmm. and, and things that are, are really, you know, tied to their money.

Correct. Could derail their retirement. But, but I would disagree with that because long-term healthcare, I believe is going to just, just morph into an epidemic that this country's never seen before with their baby boomer generation. Getting older and older and the need for, for healthcare. And, and I have a little story about that.

So my first experience with nursing home care, and I'm gonna say institutional care, right, was when I was 15 years old. A friend of mine said, Hey, I can get you on at, at this nursing home down here. And I said, well, great, you know, A dollar 65 an hour, by the way. So I'm dating myself, , and I said, great.

And so I went in, I filled out the application and they, they asked me to come in for my first day for, for an orientation, and I will never, ever forget that day. The sights and the smells that I experienced terrified me. . One of the reasons why I'm a big proponent of living in your home as long as you can and having in-home healthcare, and there's a couple other stories too, and my mother and my mother-in-law this, and, and by the way, in full disclosure, this was many years before I got into the financial services industry, and so the difference between the two women, My wife's brother had the wherewithal to get a long-term care policy for his mom, and we didn't.

For my mom, our plan was she was just gonna stay with my sister in their big home, and that my sister would take care of her. But no one counted on my mother having a, a minor stroke, a heart attack, and just being, I see my sister not being able to move. And so the difference between the two women are this, my mother died in a nursing home by herself with no one around, and my mother-in-law died peacefully in her home with her loved ones around.

Wow. So that is why, another reason why I'm so you know, so I'm such a big proponent of long-term care. In, in more importantly in-home, he.

to that end, you can imagine what it does to caregivers, family members, people that have to see a loved one decline. That's very difficult. The idea that it's in an institution and you may not be able to get to it, or in Michael's case, his mother died by herself.

Mm-hmm. That's not the kind of thing you want to think about, and it's something you have to be proactive about. As we talked previous shows, Dr. David Bernstein mentioned about the need for proactivity and when it comes to this kind of thing, there are things you can do. Introduce our guest today. I want to get into this with

our.

Yeah. So Dr. Bernstein is joining us and Dr. Bernstein is a retired physician but has 40 years in geriatric care. And then Joe Wicker who is the franchise owner of the Tampa Home Health home helpers.

Now, Joe, we talked a little bit before the show. I'm trying to get an idea of how, how you fill fit into this.

But man, that story from Michael about the mom dying at an institution that's gotta touch a lot of people out.

Yeah. You know, James, when polled roughly 95% of seniors say that they would like to age in place in, in their home. And while there are some circumstances where someone may need to reside in a memory care unit or a skilled nursing facility, for the most part if the proper planning is done and the care is in place, seniors can age in their home and maintain a great deal of their I.

Now you

can imagine what that does for the patient. Have familiarity with the people, the environment. Doctor, we talked about that, that need for that idea of keeping the mind active and going, oh,

sure. It's incredibly important and, and toward Joe's point is it takes preparation and planning. and my wife and I joke that we have a 10 year plan and we review it every 10 years, but that's not true, Joe.

We review it every six months and we look around our house and make sure it's safe. And, and this is the environment and, and we've already fixed up a lot of things to make it as, as user friendly as possible and that we can stay there. My wife's an occupational therapist, so as a team we get ourselves together so, We can do that.

And as a geriatrician, I saw the impact of the catastrophes that happened when there was no preparation and, and there wasn't enough funds to do what would be the most comfortable. So planning is important and and the, the desire to age in place is really strong, like you said. And the other component to this, we need to consider.

When we don't do that, the burden and we, and the stress that we put on family members Yes. To, to do these jobs. And you said a statistic, I have one too. That there are 50 million Americans who provide care as caregivers every day to a population that's growing. And those are unpaid caregivers. They need to take time off from, right.

From work and, and make adjustments to their. because of lack of planning. So the planning is a really important part. And then knowing that there are organizations like yours that do this home healthcare that's incredibly important.

I agree. Joe, talk a little bit about some of the experiences you've seen and with folks out there that thought they were gonna have to go to an institution that were given the.

Peace of mind that they get to stay home.

Yeah. I, I think it, it is one of those situations that we probably don't like to think about, right? A lot of us don't want to think about getting older, but it's gonna happen to virtually all of us if we're fortunate, I guess you could say. And also like the doctor was mentioning there ends up.

Becoming an inverse relationship where the children start behaving like the parents and the parents start behaving a little bit like the children, you know, not wanting to do certain things. Mm-hmm. . And so when that plan is in place, what you you can do is you can avoid some of the, the negative outcomes the.

The ability to remain independent in your home does require a little bit of forethought because otherwise, and unfortunately, the way a lot of people come to these decisions as to what they're gonna do, the financial aspect of it, the living arrangements. That who's gonna provide care, who's gonna help manage things like the healthcare, the doctor's appointments, the finances.

A lot of those decisions are forced upon people because of an emergency, because a a a senior citizen fell, went to the hospital, gets discharged, and then people are saying, well, what do we do now? Right? Mom can't stay alone at home stay at home alone. So unfortunately, a lot of times we're forced into making these decisions, but it doesn't have to be that way.

Wow. You can imagine. Burden you feel as a, as a, as a child of a, of elderly parent having to make this decision in an emergency situation, you certainly want to consider all the alternatives and have plenty of time to make the right decision considering all aspects of this. That idea that a sudden event doctor he mentioned a fall or something, that's the way this happens most of the time, isn't, it's not a gradual thing that you see coming, that you actually can be so easily target down the.

I, yes, it's true. I, I'm there, there is an event that that moves the, the program way ahead of schedule. And I, I think some of this is generational because a prior generation lived to be 70 and died. and without the medical technology that we have now. That was the reality. But the reality today is you can retire at 65 and become disabled and live to 85.

Wow. And, and that's part of the thing that I talk about in terms of. Preparation and taking care of yourself, but then there's also the preparation of a plan. Mm-hmm. , like, how are you gonna maintain your health so that you, you avoid or delay the need for care, and then you have a really good plan in place for that care when you need it.

and that it's all part of the discussion you have with family to let them know way ahead of time, I want to age in place. Here's what I'm doing, here are the finances, here are the lack of finances and what I might call upon you to help me out with. I don't want to be a burden, but I'm gonna have a plan.

I mean, a lot of times people don't want to be a burden and don't have a plan, and that's the catastrophic event. And you're talking about then they fall, break their hip, have a heart attack, have a stroke and. , everything is shot to pieces and they end up in long-term care. And then they expend huge sums of money in that.

Yeah, and

Michael can probably speak more to the financial aspect of it, but the, the fact that seniors are living longer. We have a client that's 103. I mean, it's just amazing. And she's still living in her home and you know, relatively independent with some caregivers in the home to assist. But the, the challenge to living longer, man, that's a wonderful thing to live a long life, you know?

Is that you? outlive your resources, right? And so when most senior citizens own their home, but when you sell the home and end up spending that money on rent at a facility you know, at some point in time you just might run out of funds. And so being able to remain as healthy as possible and as independent as possible in your own home a lot of times it's going to help you from a financial standpoint.

And be able to extend your resources so that you don't have to reduce your, your level of, of comfort and care throughout you know, the rest of your life. I know, I know Michael sees some of that and, and can speak to more of that in detail, but, but we see some of our clients that do actually run out of resources and it's, it's a tough thing to.

I could

imagine, Michael, talk a little, you're so interested in, in making sure folks are prepared. You talk about this all the time, you gotta be ready for these kind of things.

Absolutely. And you know, there's an old saying it's too early to plan. until it's too late. And just what Joe had touched on, people are sometimes they, they haven't planned in advance.

And just like my mother's example, right? We didn't plan in advance. We never thought in a million years my mom was as healthy as she could be. And then one day, bam, she's not. And it was almost a three year. trudge that we went through. And and so, you know, most people have the resources. They don't think that they do, but there are a lot of things sitting around assets that we can pool together, right.

And, and give them resources so that they can , you know, afford this. And a new exciting thing has just happened in the last couple weeks. There's some insurance, well, there is a insurance provider out there right now that is going to issue guaranteed policies, guaranteed issue policies. So even if your loved one finds themself in a facility, In really bad shape has some preexisting conditions, they cannot be denied coverage.

And that's new. You say it's brand

new? Yeah. Wow. So, so something positive that we'd looked at, Joe. When you give your example there, of the 103 year old lady, I could imagine if she did run out of resources and was told, Hey, now it's time. You've gotta get up and get outta here. at 103 years old.

That's, that's a traumatic event to have to get somebody

up and out. Yeah, and like I said, there are circumstances where, where people need to go to another level of care outside of their home, specifically, like in, in some severe memory care circumstances. But Yes. Seniors can remain actually healthier by being in their home because it's familiar surroundings.

Somebody that might have a hearing deficit or a vision deficit. It's, it's safer really for them to be in familiar surroundings. Because when you go to something like an assisted living or a skilled nursing, I mean it, there, it's a big change. Mm-hmm. . So when you're at that point, when you're, when you're like, for instance, the client you were mentioning 103 you know, It would probably be more disruptive for her to, to go somewhere else at this point.

Absolutely. Even if, you know, they were gonna wait on her hand and foot, I mean, it would be more disruptive to her at this point. She's getting around the best she can. She knows her home. Right. And that's the, the most important thing is she's comfortable. She knows what, what her surroundings are. And so by augmenting her remaining in home, by having some caregivers go in four hours a day, eight hours a.

Different shifts, just making sure that those activities of daily living are happening. Happening. The bathing, the dressing, the, the medications have been taken, that nutrition is happening, you know hydration, preventing urinary tract infections that are common amongst the senior population. Just doing those basic things is what's helping people like that remain independent in their home and not have to tap into all of their resources to be able to afford really high rents, right?

That can occur in some places

now, luckily here on the show we've had. Michael Parker, who talked a little bit about that kind of thing earlier we talked about on another show. So really take advantage of the senior care show here. You can check it out@seniorcareshow.net, and we wanna make sure that this information is available for you.

Dr. David Bernstein, power Five Life and Joe Wicker and everyone that we bring on is really trying to do you a service and give this information to you because we want you to be proactive. We talk so much about planning and you hear some of these nightmare scenarios that can occur if you. Prepared or you're not ready for what's coming.

And unfortunately this is coming for everybody. This is something we've all gotta get prepared for. Michael, just talk a little bit about the dream team and how much this show can really help folks.

Yeah, so as I mentioned before people have never retired before. It's something new to them. It's aren't uncharted territory and I really think that in some ways Google.

Has really paralyzed people. Hmm. From, from making dec their decision. When you think about it, if you Google search the word investments, you come up with 350 billion results in half of a second. So you can just imagine it, right. It, it's problematic for people. And so, yeah. So they really need individualized help.

Everybody's situation is different. Their financial resources are different. You know, my goal is, is to help people find a way to to, to navigate these waters. But to your question, The senior care show. We want to make this a place, a safe space that people can come to and get that information just like from, right?

These two experts here today. And they can hear from other people other than, you know myself talking about the importance of it. No. They need to hear from other industry. professionals and, and, and glean from, you know, what they're saying like Dr. Bernstein had mentioned, you know, no suites. Mm-hmm.

That's you know, who would've thought that suites has an effect on your cognitive ability moving forward, right? Mm-hmm. . So it

all ties together, and that's the idea. We wanna be kind of a holistic here on the senior care show. Yeah. Come up with as many ways to help you as possible and make sure that you have resources.

You're not alone out. Come on, check out the show, senior care show.net. We, in addition to the expert contributors on our panel here, we'll have lots of other information and places for you to go. We wanna be a resource for you as you approach this delicate issue and, and look forward to be proactive and kind of make sure that you're prepared for whatever might come.

You wanna close with for us. David.

Sure. And thanks so much. I, I want to say one more thing about what Joe was talking about and, and it has to do with the environment. Is it, not only is it being home in your environment, but it's having a continuity of staff. Yeah. And a limited number of people so that you know everybody after a period of time.

Because in Facilit. There's a lot of turnover, there's a lot of different shifts, and you might not necessarily be seeing the same people all the time, but if you can develop a rapport with your caregiver and vice versa the care plan works so much better. Yeah, and I love being on this show and sharing my thoughts with you.

I I'm, I'm available to, to tell people that my website is power of. life.com and my books are available on Amazon and I love to talk about them, but I love to share what I know with audiences so that even if they glean a little piece of what I talk about, it can make a difference in their lives. And it, I also talk about it being proactive.

that it needs to have a plan. Right? And it's never too early to start either your lifestyle changes or putting a, a plan together for your finances, Michael, to, to deal with stuff that, that, that you're talking about and even know about the as you age or as a family member ages, know about the home agencies that are in town so that you could make a decision quickly and say, yes, I interviewed the people from this organization.

Mm-hmm. , I know they're good and that's who I want to use. Right. Right. Failing to plan is planning to fail. That's

right. Joe Wicker, tell us a little bit final thoughts from you.

Yeah. You know, if, like people have been saying, you know, it's never too early to plan if you, you know yourself or a loved one.

You, you expect that you're getting to those years that you might start needing some help. Start networking. Find out who you know that knows someone in the senior space, whether it's a financial planner, medical professionals, home care providers. Go ahead and start having some of those conversations now.

And if you or your loved one have a chronic illness that you've been struggling with I, I know that that can be frustrating. Something like C O P D or chf, congestive heart failure, things like that. The positive side is that it's something you've been dealing with. You know what's coming. You can kind of plan a little bit.

It's chronic. It's something that you can see out a little bit of ways. So go ahead and start making those plans now. Figure it out. Get with a financial professional, get with your healthcare providers and find out what that next level of care is gonna be for you and how you can set those services up.

When the time. and you know, you can reach out to us at home helpers home care.com and and, and, and reach out to, like I said, your friends and and neighbors because we're all gonna go through this at some point in time or we know someone who does. So there's help out there.

That's right. Joe Wicker again, home helpers home care.com.

We. Dr. David Bernstein, power five life.com and of course, Michael Watkins put it all together. This is the senior care show, and check us out and make sure you like and subscribe to this. Thank you so much.