Five Ways Participant Assistance and Care Helps Your Family Member
One of the features of residential habilitation is Participant Assistance and Care, or PAC. PAC services focus on helping your family member in a variety of different ways.
Assistance with Mobility Issues
If your family member has mobility issues, that can be difficult to manage at times. PAC services can help your family member to learn to use new assistive devices and can help with transfers. Some particularly difficult transfers might be from a wheelchair to the bathtub, for instance, and having assistance makes this much safer and easier. This type of assistance can also help your family member to feel more secure out and about in public.
Help with Errands
Something else that can be difficult for your family member to manage can be regular errands. Grocery shopping, picking up prescriptions, and other routine tasks can be much more complicated for your family member. With a little bit of help, though, those tasks can be accomplished in a much shorter amount of time and with much less frustration for your family member.
Assistance with Complicated Life Tasks
Some tasks are more complicated, but they’re still routine and need to be handled. Things like handling mail, especially important mail that requires a response, and paying bills may be part of what your family member needs help managing. PAC services can help with these, ensuring that your family member isn’t struggling with them alone.
Supervision and Companionship During Outings
If your family member has appointments and activities to attend, it might be a good idea to have someone go along for assistance and for companionship. Participant Assistance and Care can help with this, ensuring that your family member is in good hands while out and about. If the trip becomes overwhelming in any way, someone is with your family member and can ensure that everything is fine.
Help with Completing a Set Group of Tasks
Sometimes there might be a set of tasks or a list that needs to be completed by your family member. Having someone available to provide verbal and visual prompts may be just the answer to ensure that the list does indeed get completed. This can be tremendously empowering for your family member, because being able to complete a complex set of necessary tasks is definitely an accomplishment.
There are so many other ways that PAC can help your family member to be able to manage and to cope with the activities of daily life on a regular basis. Your family member may need more assistance with some tasks at certain points than at others, and goals can be adjusted accordingly.
If you are considering participant assistance & care in Carmel, IN, please call the caring staff at RSI Cares. Serving Greater Indianapolis Area. Call for Immediate Info & Assistance: 317-471-0750.
As a practicing Registered Nurse, Etelka was keenly aware of a void in quality patient care that could be provided in the home. She embarked upon a journey to develop a home health care agency that would exceed all expectations and become a trusted partner to physicians and patients.
A Distinguished Career From Nurse to Director of Nursing to President of Home Services Unlimited
Etelka’s distinguished career followed a logical progression to her position as President of Home Services Unlimited. She graduated as a nurse practitioner with a Bachelor of Nursing (RN) in 1972 from Meshgorya University in the Ukraine, close to where she lived with her family. She married her husband Phil in 1973 and decided in 1977 that they would relocate to the United States to be closer to family and to come to this land of opportunity. With an eagerness to continue her budding career, Etelka sat for and passed her Boards in the U.S. in 1979.
A Love and Talent for Working with the Elderly
Etelka began her nursing career in the U.S. at Colonial Crest, now part of Golden Living, where shewasthe In-service Coordinator, the Director of Training and Education and Director of Nursing, a position she occupied for several years.
With a group of partners, she co-founded Adept Corporation, which operated group homes for the mentally challenged. The business was successful and in 1996, Etelka sold her share to return to her roots, caring for the elderly.
In January of 1997, Etelka opened Home Services Unlimited as a fully licensed business to provide home health care. In her quest to learn to do better for her patients, she had already obtained a Masters in Healthcare Administration (MHA) in May of 1990 from the College of St. Francis. As President of Home Services Unlimited, Inc., Etelka guides the trusted, experienced care model Home Services Unlimited uses to continue providing excellent home health care.
Giving Back to the Community of Indianapolis
Volunteering for community services is a high priority for Etelka. Her memberships include the Indiana Association of Rehabilitation Facilities, Executive Women in Health Care and the Indiana Association for Home and Hospice Care, where she is a member of the Board of Directors.
Etelka has also served on the Board of Directors with Hooverwood Home, a highly regarded geriatric facility, since 1997 and as the President for 2005-2006. Through her community work, she has received several awards and accolades, including the Nora McFarland award in 2002, from the Indiana Association of Home and Hospice Care.
Etelka was honored as a “Health Care Hero” by the Indianapolis Business Journal. The issue can be read online here:
http://mags.ibj.com/activemagazine/welcome/html/ibjhch.html.
After clicking on the link, then click on the image of the issue’s front page. After that, you can browse through the issue or click in a box near the top of your internet browser to adjust the page to 17, which is where Etelka’s article appears.
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