Dementia, including Alzheimers, Vascular Dementia and Residential Care Placement

Making that decision to move your loved one with some level of dementia into residential care may be one of the most difficult choices that families face.

Most caregivers consider a move only when their loved one's needs have exhausted their own abilities to continue to provide help.

However, persons with dementia reach a point in their functional abilities when out-of-home placement may offer them a safer environment.

Care homes often establish a consistent, predictable schedule that may provide comfort. It is important for families to recognise when it is in everyone's best interest to explore alternatives.

When is it Time to Think About Moving Your Loved One Who Lives Alone

Here are a few signs that it may be time to start thinking about moving your loved one to a care home:

Poor personal hygiene and/or soiled clothes.

Poor driving skills, accidents.

Memory loss and/or personality changes.

Loss of appetite/not remembering to eat.

Spoiled food in the refrigerator.

Problems with bill paying, home maintenance, cleaning and other household tasks.

When is it Definitely Time to Plan the Move

These are signs that your loved one may need an immediate change to safer living arrangements:

Wandering from home despite changes the caregiver has made to prevent wandering.

Frequent medication mistakes.

Lack of adequate food and/or fluid.

An unsafe/unclean home environment (not taking garbage out, dirty dishes).

Unsafe behavior (leaving stove on, exterior doors open at night).

Physical abuse of spouse or other in-home caregiver.

Need for night-time supervision that cannot be met by in-home caregiver.

When arrangements for a move are in place, and the person with dementia is unable or unwilling to agree, consider scheduling a family meeting without the person with dementia.

The meeting is the time to decide what to do and work towards unanimous agreement with the plan. aged care placement needs and outcome. We charge an affordable fee for our placement service. You will receive quality information and unbiased advice about many aged care homes.

Talk to us about A G Eastwood Hostel or similar aged care homes so that you can make an informed decision about this aged care home.

Our staff have been providing information, practical assistance and emotional support to families navigating the aged care placement process since 2002. Nobody can know more about aged care placement than our experienced consultants. As well as the knowledge and experience gained from helping hundreds of families, we are still passionate about helping families through this emotional time - read our vision and principles.

We offer a complete placement service that delivers worthwhile benefits to family clients.

Better still, read the testimonials of our past family clients.

We hope you find some useful information on our website, such as our comments about each of the Five Steps to Residential Care.

You can download residential aged care application forms and information sheets from our resources page.

We have provided a large number of useful websites providing related information, both government websites and private websites.

We have provided a list of aged care homes for each state: new south wales, queensland, victoria, south australia, western australia, tasmania, northern territory and canberra.

Or if you have an individual family need or specific question, use our simple enquiry form.