If you can’t be right there with your senior, you might have worried that it’s not possible to be a caregiver from far away. But you really can be successful with long-distance caregiving if you pay attention to some details. 

Keep the Lines of Communication Open

It’s vital that you and your senior have open lines of communication as much as possible. This might mean that you have a set time that you talk every day, even if it’s just to say that all is well. Or it might mean that your senior knows that she can contact you any time about whatever is going on, even if she’s worried about bothering you. Work out how you both want to communicate and stick to it. 

See if Your Employer Has Programs to Help 

Very often employee assistance programs, particularly for larger companies, have tools and programs to help with caregiving responsibilities. This is true whether you and your senior live in the same area or you’re far away. Take some time to do a little bit of research about what sorts of programs and opportunities might be available to you so that you can take advantage of them when you need to do so. 

Put Backup Plans Together 

Backup plans are one of the biggest keys to making long-distance caregiving work. They’re even more important when you live far away, because your senior might have an emergency that requires you to drop everything and rush to where she is. If you don’t already know how you’d handle that, that would be the first backup plan you need to put together. It never hurts to have at least one or two backups to your backups, while you’re at it. 

Hire Home Care Services  

When you can’t be there, it’s comforting to know that someone can stop in and check on your senior for you. Hiring home care providers to do that for you gives your senior someone who can handle daily tasks for her and it gives you the knowledge on a regular basis that all is truly well with your senior. This can be a huge relief, both for you and for your senior. 

Make sure that you pay attention to when your senior’s needs are changing and when the system you have set up might not work for her as well as it once did. Adjusting those plans and systems can make a huge difference and can allow you to be a long-distance caregiver for a long time. 

If you or an aging loved one are considering hiring home care services near Greer, SC, contact Heart of the Carolinas Home Care at 864-991-3116.  Providing Home Care Services in Greenville, Simpsonville, Greer, Anderson, Spartanburg, Mauldin, Seneca, Laurens, Charleston, Columbia and the surrounding areas. 

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Edward Harrison

Founder at Heart of the Carolinas

Edward Harrison founded the Heart of the Carolinas Homecare in 2007 when he saw there was a need for caregivers that provide non-medical home care services, at a price that most people could afford. It was standard in the industry to require hourly minimums and it was common to be assigned a caregiver, not matched with one based on your individual personal needs. Edward understood that to make a successful relationship between caregiver and client, skills were not enough, personality and compatibility plays as much a role as do skills.

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