How do you as a family help your senior loved on through the process of downsizing to a new home for a life change? Whether it be to independent living for active seniors, or maybe they're transitioning to an adult family home, or go into a senior community, maybe memory care or dementia care, there are a lot of options out there. Daphne Davis from Pinnacle Senior Placements joins Suzanne Newman on the Answers for Elders Radio Show to provide us with a checklist for helping our loved ones through this challenge. She talks from the perspective of a family not having a placement advisor to walk alongside them and giving them all the little details of how to how a successful transition. She highly recommends selecting a placement advisor or referral agent – they don't cost you anything and provide a wealth of information during this process.

Daphne says, "You need to know what your budget is, not only the total amount that you have, but your monthly expenditure that you can afford. There might be cash flow issues that go along. Now. If you had an advisor, they'd be bringing all of these things up and they'd be working through it and they know on the top of their head how much things cost.

If you have a book that you're looking at, very often that information is not going to be accurate. It's going to be information that is at the lowest scale of pricing for rent and care. Know that there's two different things, if you're looking at assisted living or independent living in a large community, the numbers that you see are not going to include care. Look how many things you might trip over. And we haven't even gotten to the building yet."

Daphne goes into detail about her checklist:

1. Have a clear picture of who needs care, assess the situation.

2. Assess the budget.

3. Know the general area they're moving to.

4. Establish your highest values

5. Do they convert to Medicaid when money runs out?

Reach Pinnacle at 1-855-734-1500 or visit PinnacleSeniorPlacements.com.

To final a referral agent in your area, visit the National Placement & Referral Alliance website search.

Learn more:

* Pinnacle Senior Placements at Answers for Elders.

* About Daphne Davis

* Hear more podcasts with Daphne Davis

Check out our affiliate podcast Alzheimer’s Speaks.

Mentioned in this episode:

Legacy Estate Planning

Legacy Estate Planning

Chateau Retirement

Chateau Retirement

Amanda Krueger joins Suzanne Newman on the Answers for Elders podcast to talk about how IT is used to prevent falls at Chateau Retirement. The interview was recorded on site at Chateau Pacific in Lynnwood, Washington. Amanda is Vice President of Health Services, and oversees the health and care provided at Chateau Retirement Communities.

Amanda says, "About a year ago I started really diving into our fall prevention program at Chateau and a statistic just kept sticking in my brain. After a significant injury fall of an elderly resident, they have an 80% chance of mortality. How can I sleep at night knowing that? We have to do our best to keep our residents safe, so I started looking into technology [and chose] AUGi. It is a motion sensor, it is a technology that we have primarily in the bedrooms of residents, so that way it can monitor when they're in bed... You can set it at a high fall-sensitivity, and it'll alert the staff when our resident is getting out of bed. So if you have a resident or a family member that has dementia, and is not able to ambulate safely on their own, this protects them in the sense that our staff can get in there timely, before they're up out of bed, to prevent what could be a potential catastrophic injury with a fall.

"It is an AI-sensing technology so if a resident isn't walking the same like they used to, it can send alerts to us that their their gait is off a little bit. And then it also just tells us that a staff member is spending 40 minutes a day [with them] when their care plan is for 20 minutes a day, so that could tell us that maybe that resident needs a little bit more care. Or they're spending 45 minutes in the bathroom, that can tell us that maybe they're needing a little bit extra care so they stay safe.

"So it is a great tool for the staff... Every two weeks we're having a meeting with a member of the clinical team from AUGi... By getting those notices and getting in there within a couple of minutes – they call it AUGi saves If we're in the room by three minutes – we've had hundreds of saves since we've implemented this technology. Yes, we can't predict that it would have been an actual fall. But... if we're getting in there timely and preventing your loved one from being on the ground, that's that's going to be a win... And so the family members are loving that piece of mind, knowing that we have this technology in our community."Chateau Retirement provides independent living, assisted living, and memory care services. They have been locally owned and family operated for more than 25 years. Chateau Retirement has three communities in Washington's Seattle/Puget Sound area: Chateau Pacific in Lynnwood, Bothell Landing in Bothell, and Chateau Valley Center in Renton.

Visit them online or call 800.960.1944. Also visit Chateau's specialist page on Answers for Elders to hear more of their shows.

Check out our affiliate podcast Alzheimer’s Speaks.

Mentioned in this episode:

Chateau Retirement

Chateau Retirement

Sean Godfrey, vice president of technology for Chateau Retirement, joins Suzanne Newman on the Answers for Elders podcast to continue their conversation about how technology can improve the lives of senior living residents. The interview was recorded on site at Chateau Pacific in Lynnwood, Washington.

Suzanne notes, "A lot of organizations out there outsource their technology. You guys do not. You keep everything in-house. So you protect that data, it doesn't go to an outside source."

Sean says, "We maintain and make sure that everyone is safe when they're using our networks and using our services, and that we're not allowing third-party vendors to come in and stipulate their standards on top of what we have already done our due diligence with.

"We do abide by HIPPA compliance laws. I look at compliance with these and the European Union or the California laws of privacy, and try to incorporate those types of things. Even though we're not held accountable to those standards today, who's to say that maybe next week or in a year or two that we won't be? Putting Chateau up to that degree of being in compliance with NIST and ISOs and HIPPA compliances really allows us to make sure for our residents and our employees, we're securing their data properly."

Sean adds, "We have technicians that are designated just for IT assets. Our residents... have computers and laptops, cell phones, televisions, [cars]. So I expanded our our realm of influence, so to speak, so we can actually help our residents directly, similar to a maintenance work order like 'I need a light bulb changed.' Residents can call down to the desk and say, 'I forgot my password for my email account,' and we have staff on hand that can come and help those residents write, reset passwords, and remove viruses from devices."

Chateau Retirement provides independent living, assisted living, and memory care services. They have been locally owned and family operated for more than 25 years. Chateau Retirement has three communities in Washington's Seattle/Puget Sound area: Chateau Pacific in Lynnwood, Bothell Landing in Bothell, and Chateau Valley Center in Renton.

Visit them online or call 800.960.1944. Also visit Chateau's specialist page on Answers for Elders to hear more of their shows.

Check out our affiliate podcast Alzheimer’s Speaks.

Mentioned in this episode:

Chateau Retirement

Chateau Retirement

The world is evolving, and technology is impacting senior living communities for the better. Sean Godfrey, vice president of technology for Chateau Retirement, joins Suzanne Newman on the Answers for Elders podcast to talk about how they use technology to improve the lives of residents. The interview was recorded on site at Chateau Pacific in Lynnwood, Washington.

Sean says, "We're looking at how the technology will enhance our senior our seniors' lives and make it easier for them to age in place, and not have to move somewhere else because the services aren't available in the area.

"I like to think of one of the roles I play is to help our seniors through their digital lifecycle, from sales and marketing is where it typically starts, [where] they take their information and their likes and dislikes. 'I like long walks on the beach with my puppy dog kind of thing, right?' And then translating that down to operations, and having that seamlessly transfer from one department to the other. So we use technology to smooth those edges between departments... really has helped us get to those data points of helping our seniors. We still need to be managers, but we don't have to manage our people as much now, and we can focus more on the seniors.

"We we innovated, back in the early 2000s, having free Wi-Fi access for all of our seniors and their guests. And so Chateau has always been on that cutting edge of technology. It's a balancing act, because you don't want to be too far on the edge and get into the beta testing. I have to do my risk management very carefully and make sure that the technologies we are using are secured from a technical standpoint, but also it's usable for an end user."

Chateau Retirement provides independent living, assisted living, and memory care services. They have been locally owned and family operated for more than 25 years. Chateau Retirement has three communities in Washington's Seattle/Puget Sound area: Chateau Pacific in Lynnwood, Bothell Landing in Bothell, and Chateau Valley Center in Renton.

Visit them online or call 800.960.1944. Also visit Chateau's specialist page on Answers for Elders to hear more of their shows.

Check out our affiliate podcast Alzheimer’s Speaks.

If are you able to take this on, what is all involved in taking care of a loved one as a family caregiver. Are you in denial over the next chapter of caring for someone you love? Or are you ready? Daphne Davis from Pinnacle Senior Placements joins Suzanne on the Answers for Elders Podcast for the last of their six-part series being prepared for difficult conversations and what comes after.

Daphne says, "I recently met with a family where dad is about 85 years old and mom had passed away a couple of years ago. He's living in his own home and two weeks ago, got a diagnosis of very advanced cancer in his lungs that's metastasized to his stomach. And he has two daughters, one lives about 5 minutes away and the other is about 45 minutes away. And this family had cold water splashed in their face and they were beyond knowing what to do. So I got the phone call, and went over there immediately to help of navigate their next steps, because they had no one to be able to help dad. And Dad wants to die in his own home, and certainly has that right. And we can make that happen.

"But it's going through the whole process of what that meant to his two daughters. And one of the daughters was on the phone because she lives 45 minutes away, and the other daughter was sitting in the living room with us. And you could see the stress. The daughters get along just fine. They're sisters. But there was a significant difference in their perceptions and perspectives and sense of responsibility from being 5 minutes away or 45 minutes away. And so as you're thinking about becoming caregivers as family members for someone, really try hard to be outside of yourself and see the big picture."

When Suzanne was caring for her mom, she says, "Nobody sat me down and said, Mom's not going to get better. What we're doing is not to make her better. It's to make her comfortable. If they just would have said that to me, I would have had a completely different perspective. But health care professionals, they don't do a good job oftentimes of educating the family of where are we at in the process."

Daphne explains, "Health care professionals are on automatic pilot. This is what they do day in, day out. And it's not necessarily that they don't want to. It's just an oversight sometimes. Or it's a time issue, having 15 minutes with you in and out. So as a family caregiver, you might have to be thinking about the companionship and the socialization, boredom. You become the person that sits down and listens to dad's stories, or reads a book to him, or watches the old Westerns with him and seriously are engaged in it. And it's not your time to be taking care of your own bills because Dad does need socialization. He's lonely."

Reach Pinnacle at 1-855-734-1500 or visit PinnacleSeniorPlacements.com.

To final a referral agent in your area, visit the National Placement & Referral Alliance website search.

Learn more:

* Pinnacle Senior Placements at Answers for Elders.

* About Daphne Davis

* Hear more podcasts with Daphne Davis

Check out our affiliate podcast Alzheimer’s Speaks.

Mentioned in this episode:

Legacy Estate Planning

Legacy Estate Planning

Chateau Retirement

Chateau Retirement

How do you pay for care? And care is expensive. You will be in stick shock to learn how much senior living costs. You may also be surprised at the reality of a senior loved one's actual level of functioning. Are you in denial over the next chapter of caring for someone you love? Or are you ready? Daphne Davis from Pinnacle Senior Placements joins Suzanne on the Answers for Elders Podcast for part 5 of their six-part series being prepared for difficult conversations and what comes after.

Daphne says, "There's an element of planning that I hope our listeners will hear and know that you can't wait until you're 70, 75 years old to think about this. It really is a sweet spot, about 55 to 60, to be thinking about this in terms of considering even long term care insurance, in terms of maximizing your buying power with your estate. But having resources and hearing the shock of the cost of care is where I see shoulders drop, where I see families lose hope, The twinkle goes out of their eye and they're like, We can't afford that."

Daphne goes over some finances options, including the basics of what to consider for reverse mortgages, Aid in Attendance, Medicaid, and life settlement.

She also talks about the level of care your loved one might really need. "Your intentions are spot on. Your heart is in the right place, but you don't see, sometimes, your loved one with the eyes of reality. I'm not taking anything away from all of your family caregivers out there. But you see them differently than professional eyes. Rational eyes are here to help your mom have the highest quality of life as possible. Still keep her independence, but not stress her out because she doesn't always get her arm in the sleeve, or it's hard for her to pick out something in the closet to wear, because there might be some condition issues. Set someone up for success."

As an example, Daphne says, "Mom is in a community now and we're really understanding that if there's any kind of cognition challenges, Mom does need help getting to the dining room. Turning left or right, or getting on the elevator and what floor am I on, is too much. It’s not quality of life to stress somebody out with figuring out what button am I supposed to push? And you might be there on one day and mom pushes the button just fine. But at 8:00 in the morning for breakfast, she wasn't synapsing as well. Or mom or dad – and this is universal – can pull it together for the people that they want to please or not be a burden to. And really, as a family member, you need to listen to the people who are caring for your mom day in and day out who are the professionals. You have to have an element of trust there."

Reach Pinnacle at 1-855-734-1500 or visit PinnacleSeniorPlacements.com.

To final a referral agent in your area, visit the National Placement & Referral Alliance website search.

Learn more:

* Pinnacle Senior Placements at Answers for Elders.

* About Daphne Davis

* Hear more podcasts with Daphne Davis

Check out our affiliate podcast Alzheimer’s Speaks.

Mentioned in this episode:

Legacy Estate Planning

Legacy Estate Planning

Chateau Retirement

Chateau Retirement

Some legal paperwork is exceedingly difficult to work around if it's not filed. Are you in denial over the next chapter of caring for someone you love? Or are you ready? Daphne Davis from Pinnacle Senior Placements joins Suzanne on the Answers for Elders Podcast for part 4 of their six-part series being prepared for difficult conversations and what comes after.

Daphne says, "I am not an attorney and I'm not giving any attorney advice here today. But I will give you real life perspectives to consider, and that is do not avoid getting the paperwork done. The biggest one is power of attorney. It lets you speak on behalf of the person while they're still alive. And there's different paperwork for after they've passed away. But power of attorney is while someone is alive, and anything can happen at any time. I don't care if you are 30 years old and have three kids and you don't have power of attorney paperwork, you should worry about that. You should have a power of attorney paperwork.

"If you're 80 years old and you haven't talked about this yet, and you don't have a power of attorney, you should really – I'm going to use the word – worry about this. This needs to be taken care of. It creates so much chaos, so many hiccups to get over, hurdles to get over, makes protocols and systems work so much slower, if you don't have a power of attorney in place. I hope you heard me really loud and clear. It's really important. It's a very important document."

Reach Pinnacle at 1-855-734-1500 or visit PinnacleSeniorPlacements.com.

To final a referral agent in your area, visit the National Placement & Referral Alliance website search.

Learn more:

* Pinnacle Senior Placements at Answers for Elders.

* About Daphne Davis

* Hear more podcasts with Daphne Davis

Check out our affiliate podcast Alzheimer’s Speaks.

Mentioned in this episode:

Legacy Estate Planning

Legacy Estate Planning

Chateau Retirement

Chateau Retirement

Learn what you need to know about how the best referral agents help focus senior living choices. Are you in denial over the next chapter of caring for someone you love? Or are you ready? Daphne Davis from Pinnacle Senior Placements joins Suzanne on the Answers for Elders Podcast for part 3 of their six-part series being prepared for difficult conversations and what comes after.

Daphne says, "I'm transparent. I'm going to choose places that meet your highest values. I'm going to tell the communities this is the highest value. This is why we're here. When the agent is with you, and you're doing your tours, I think that the agent should be very involved in the questions, to be sure to ask. The agent is going to know the pluses and minuses of the community. And if the agent doesn't have a relationship with the community of care in such a way that they can be honest and upfront that says, here's an area that you're going to have to compromise on, I don't think that's a transparent agent.

"You’re making a big decision. Agents should help you walk through the pluses and minuses and you should be able to walk away after seeing the third community walk away and be able to say, I want this from A and this from B in this from C, because then the agent did their job. They didn't stack the deck. They made your job hard. And all three of those communities are viable options. Now you, the family, get to fine tune it."

Reach Pinnacle at 1-855-734-1500 or visit PinnacleSeniorPlacements.com.

To final a referral agent in your area, visit the National Placement & Referral Alliance website search.

Learn more:

* Pinnacle Senior Placements at Answers for Elders.

* About Daphne Davis

* Hear more podcasts with Daphne Davis

Check out our affiliate podcast Alzheimer’s Speaks.

Mentioned in this episode:

Chateau Retirement

Chateau Retirement

Legacy Estate Planning

Legacy Estate Planning

Referral or placement agents are an information post. Are you in denial over the next chapter of caring for someone you love? Or are you ready? Daphne Davis from Pinnacle Senior Placements joins Suzanne on the Answers for Elders Podcast for part 2 of their six-part series being prepared for difficult conversations and what comes after.

First, Daphne explains what a referral agent does: "We call ourselves an information post. We are never decision makers. In the whole United States, there's a whole plethora of people just like me who help you gather the information that's pertinent to your state... We we are like a conduit between you, the consumer, and the people who provide housing and care and where the people who know what's going on in this housing and care industry. We find out about you, the unique consumer of what are your highest values, what works for you in this housing and care community, how some of the logistical pieces that work.

"An agent who has your best interest at heart will meet with you. There are some situations that because we're so mobile that we hold Zoom meetings because some of the siblings or the decision makers might be out of state, but usually we try very hard to meet one-on-one. In choosing to work with a placement or referral agent, there's no expense to you. The expense is to the community of care, right? Because we work off of their marketing budget. We are an extension of their community. That doesn't mean we have exclusivity to recommend to 5 to 10 places. A good agent should be working with all communities of care in the state. And based on your highest values, be able to have all of those communities of care as an option for you. At the same time, we function as kind of a clearing house or a person who's doing your vetting. I personally feel after 25 years of doing this job, that there's no way for any consumer to know the real nuts and bolts of a community of care. It's impossible for me to know everything about every community, because there's so many new ones."

As to the best reasons why you should bring in a referral agent, Daphne says, "You need to have the hard conversations. You are the family, but to actually facilitate them and to know how to walk through this is very difficult for family member to family member. And the number one reason is because you have a primary relationship, and that primary relationship usurps everything else. In most situations, mom and dad still stay mom and dad and you're still the child. That's what it comes down to. 'You're not going to tell me what to do. You're not in my head. You’re not here every day. You bounce in four times a year to see us, and you think you know what's going on with us?' Why would you even consider having somebody like me come into this equation? First of all, it doesn't cost you anything. But the primary reason is, you keep your primary relationship. Let the agent be the one who has these hard conversations. We’re the professional, we are the expert. You are not. You might be a nurse, you might be an occupational therapist, you might be a police person, you might have been an EMT, but you are not the expert [in this area]."

Reach Pinnacle at 1-855-734-1500 or visit PinnacleSeniorPlacements.com.

To final a referral agent in your area, visit the National Placement & Referral Alliance website search.

Learn more:

* Pinnacle Senior Placements at Answers for Elders.

* About Daphne Davis

* Hear more podcasts with Daphne Davis

Check out our affiliate podcast Alzheimer’s Speaks.

Mentioned in this episode:

Chateau Retirement

Chateau Retirement

Legacy Estate Planning

Legacy Estate Planning

Are you in denial over the next chapter of caring for someone you love? Or are you ready? One of the things we hear a lot is, mom and dad are just fine. They're getting older, but they still do this or that. But the fact is, oftentimes, families are in denial and maybe they're not fine. Daphne Davis from Pinnacle Senior Placements joins Suzanne on the Answers for Elders Podcast for a six-part series on whether you're in denial, and about having difficult conversations.

Daphne says, "I'm going to say in 2025, currently I'm seeing a lot of skepticism, a lot of fear, a lot of lack of trust, a lot of what ifs, and that it's becoming okay to to maintain the status quo. Even though there may be people quietly suffering, overtly suffering, things can start sneaking up on you... I have never seen so much inaction. That causes a ripple effect of suffering. And so what I mean by that is, it's easier to go along with what whatever mom or dad says, whatever the aunt or uncle says, whatever your wife or husband says, it's just easier to go with. They said they were fine, So they're fine. Rather than doing any investigation or listening to your gut or stepping outside of yourself, knowing this is going to take time, energy is going to interrupt your pattern of life. But in the in the long run, you will have this relationship that hopefully to their last breath will be meaningful and beautiful."

Regarding how to start tough conversations, Daphne says, "This is how I do it personally and professionally. And that's to name the thing that you're most afraid of. Just name it. It will lose power. Dad, I know this is going to be a hard conversation. I want you to hear my heart, not just my words. I know this is not a conversation that that we're wanting to have, but trust me that it's one that's going to be good. Name what you're afraid of. Yeah, I know you want to keep doing your laundry, but going up and down the stairs to get to the basement, to the washer is making me so afraid of the consequences if you have an accident. And here comes the end. The defensiveness. 'I'm fine. I haven't. I haven't fallen down the stairs yet. I'm not going to.' I know you're not planning to, but, Mom, you're in your eighth decade of life and your body is not the same. It's not going to bounce back like when you were 40. Mm. All those things they rest in logic. They do rest in the what ifs, and a lot of people don't want to live in the what ifs."

Reach Pinnacle at 1-855-734-1500 or visit PinnacleSeniorPlacements.com.

To final a referral agent in your area, visit the National Placement & Referral Alliance website search.

Learn more:

* Pinnacle Senior Placements at Answers for Elders.

* About Daphne Davis

* Hear more podcasts with Daphne Davis

Check out our affiliate podcast Alzheimer’s Speaks.

Mentioned in this episode:

Chateau Retirement

Chateau Retirement

Legacy Estate Planning

Legacy Estate Planning