Planning Ahead for Your Parent's Journey with Parkinson's Disease

Parkinson's disease impacts about one million people around the country. If your elderly parent is one of the approximately 60,000 people who will receive a diagnosis of this condition this year, you are starting a care journey that will bring with it challenges and experiences that you might not have ever considered as a possibility when thinking of being a caregiver for your parent. By taking the time to plan ahead and put the proper measures into place now you can make this journey less stressful, more meaningful, and more beneficial for your elderly parent, and for you.

Use these tips to plan ahead for your parent's journey with Parkinson's disease:

• Understand the disease. Make sure that you know as much as you can about the disease as possible so that you and your parent can feel more confident. This includes knowing what exactly PD is, your parent's current stage, their prognosis, and what you may have to expect from their progression. It is also important that you and your parent fully understand all of the treatment and management options that are available to them so that they can make the decision that is right for them and their personal care and health goals.
   
• Start care as soon as possible. Parkinson's disease is a progressive disease. This means that your parent will experience new, different, and worsening symptoms over the course of their progression. Staring a home care arrangement as early in the disease as possible makes it so that your parent is prepared to handle these changes as they come. Because the increase in symptoms can be quite sudden and drastic, having an in home senior care services provider in the home with your parent already allows for them to increase care as necessary.
   
• Be flexible. Parkinson's disease is a very personal experience. Every person who deals with it will have their own experience with the disease and progress through it in their own way. This means that even if you know several people who have had PD you cannot use their experience to gauge what your loved one might go through. It is essential that you remain flexible and be prepared to handle the progression of the disease as it comes. This means preparing as much as you can for the symptoms that they might experience, but being willing to respond to the symptoms that they actually experience as they arise. This prevents the frustration that comes from not having things "work out" the way that they expect them to and enables you to put your energy and effort into addressing their needs promptly.
   
• Know their wishes. It is vital that at the beginning of their experience with this disease you keep in mind the middle and end of it. This is not meant to be a pessimistic exercise or one that prevents your parent from working on their treatment and management efforts. Instead, it is meant as a way to record your parent's wishes, opinions, and thoughts regarding their future. Take the time to talk to your parent about how they feel in terms of artificial life sustaining measures, resuscitation, and various medical treatments and issues. Once these opinions are recorded, your parent, and you, will feel much more confident and have greater peace of mind heading forward in your care journey. 

http://www.pdf.org/en/parkinson_statistics