Caring for people with respiratory disease

There are between 1 to 2 million Americans who suffer from respiratory disease. Living with respiratory disease can create many obstacles in a patient’s life, often affecting their day-to-day routine. However, agencies cater to all types of needs. So, patients can have peace of mind when hiring a caregiver.

Understanding respiratory disease

To provide better care for a senior patient with respiratory disease, caregivers must understand their needs. They must understand how exactly their disease impacts their overall functionality. A patient with pleural mesothelioma cancer will be cared for differently than a patient who has COPD. The prognosis of someone diagnosed with mesothelioma cancer, is on average, 12 months after receiving treatment.

Due to the limited treatment options available, some patients may choose to not pursue treatment; which will leave them seeking palliative care. Palliative care is a form of care that focuses on the overall comfort of the patient. This type of care takes shape in many ways; for example, from simple tasks like meal preparation and grocery shopping to taking them to doctor visits and staying by their side.

Coordinating treatment

For a patient with COPD, their care regimen may be a bit more extensive as far as treatment goes, because unlike mesothelioma, COPD has a variety of treatment options. While COPD is an incurable disease, it is managed differently which may require assistance. COPD is an umbrella term that encapsulates more common diseases we may know, such as emphysema and bronchitis. This could mean that a patient suffers from an increased build-up of mucus within their lungs or that their airways are beginning to deteriorate, leading to breathing complications.

Whatever the case may be, caregiving staff are going to need to understand the patient’s health records and be able to coordinate their treatments. Whether it be monitoring the usage of a bronchodilator, or administering oxygen therapy, the treatments in which a COPD patient may pursue may require a skilled nurse to tend to their needs. Through a combination of medication management, health monitoring, and palliative care, a senior patient with COPD is going to have a more streamlined lifestyle, allowing them to do more activities and worry less despite their illness.

Simplifying the duties of a caregiver

Caregiving is no simple task. However, through utilizing tools such as MatrixCare Connect, the ability to better understand patient data is now easier than ever before. Integrating MatrixCare Connect into your caregiving agency will allow patient transparency to be visible, for all parties involved. Through analyzing HIPAA-compliant health records and being able to monitor a patient’s latest vitals and upcoming appointments, CareCommunity creates a knowledge hub for each patient.