Ellis / Guides
The questions families ask.
Practical writing for the person doing the helping — what tends to work, what tends not to, and where the answer belongs with a doctor instead of an article.
Signs a parent may need more help at home
Most families do not notice a single dramatic moment. They notice a series of small things that only look like a pattern later.
Read thisHow to talk to a parent about accepting help
The conversation rarely fails because of the help being offered. It fails because of what accepting it seems to admit.
Read thisHow to choose everyday help for an older adult
There is no best one. There is the one that fits the person, and most of the difference is in four or five questions nobody thinks to ask until something has already gone wrong.
Read thisA smart speaker or an assistant that calls the pharmacy: what is the difference?
The difference is who ends up on the phone. A smart speaker answers the person who asked it. An assistant that calls and reports back talks to the pharmacy itself, then says what the pharmacy said.
Read thisHelping a parent who will not use a smartphone
It is almost never that the phone is too complicated. It is that the phone punishes mistakes, and nobody wants to spend their evenings being punished.
Read thisLong-distance caregiving: helping from far away
Distance does not stop you helping. It changes what help is: less doing things yourself, more making sure the right things happen without you.
Read thisManaging a parent’s prescription refills
Refills go wrong for an ordinary reason: several medicines, from several prescribers, on different schedules, each needing a different action at a different time.
Read thisHelping a parent keep track of doctor appointments
Appointments are rarely missed because somebody forgot the date. They are missed because of everything around the date — the transport, the letter that never arrived, the number nobody wanted to ring.
Read thisOrdering groceries for an elderly parent
Delivery solves the carrying and the trip. Done carelessly it also removes one of the few remaining reasons to leave the house, which is a poor trade.
Read thisA parent has come home from hospital with new prescriptions
The bag of prescriptions handed over at discharge is where most of the trouble starts: new medicines, stopped ones that nobody removed from the cupboard, and instructions given to a person who was in no state to take them in.
Read thisWhen a parent keeps calling about their pills
The fourth call of the day about the same tablets is exhausting, and it is also information: something about the routine is not holding, and the phone is how the worry is being managed.
Read thisWhen the pharmacy’s phone system defeats an older parent
Press one for refills, then enter your prescription number followed by the pound key. For a person with hearing loss, a tremor, or simply a dislike of being hurried, that sentence is the end of the call.
Read thisEllis calls your pharmacy for a refill
Ask for a refill, and Ellis telephones the pharmacy, asks for it, and writes down what the pharmacy said so the family can read it. Here is what happens on that call, what the family reads afterwards, and what Ellis will not do.
Read thisA parent’s prescription has run out on a weekend
It is Saturday afternoon, the bottle is empty, and the doctor’s office is closed until Monday. What to do depends on which medicine it is, and the person who knows is the pharmacist.
Read thisSetting up a phone for a parent who has never used one
Most phones given to older parents end up in a drawer within a month. The phone was fine. The setup and the handover were not.
Read thisWhen a parent who lives alone is not answering the phone
The phone rings out, then rings out again. Most of the time it is a phone left in another room. Some of the time it is not, and the plan for both should exist before the afternoon you need it.
Read thisRefill or renewal: why the pharmacy sent you back to the doctor
There are no refills left on this is not the pharmacy being difficult. It means the prescription has been used up as it was written, and only the person who wrote it can write another.
Read thisCaring for a parent while working full time
The job is not the hard part, and neither is the parent. It is the third thing — the calls, the forms, the errands — that has to happen between nine and five, when both the job and the parent expect you.
Read thisWhat a discharge planner does, and what to ask before you leave
Somewhere in the last day of a hospital stay a person appears with a lot of questions about home. That is the discharge planner, and the twenty minutes with them are the most useful twenty minutes of the whole stay.
Read thisWhen your siblings do not help
In most families one person does most of it — usually the one who lives closest, or the daughter, or the one who said yes first. The others are not always unwilling. Often nobody has asked them for anything specific.
Read thisGetting a parent to accept a medication reminder
A reminder is a small thing to offer and a large thing to accept. It says: I do not trust you to remember. The way round that is to make it theirs.
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