Tips on How to Keep Elderly People Safe at Home

Are you worried on how to keep your grandparents or elderly parents safe at home? To learn more about elderly care and ways of keeping them safe inside your house, read the article below.

Caring for elderly people is not that simple because they have special needs that require careful consideration and understanding. Aside from providing them nutritious food, care and love, you need to keep them safe always, especially when you are at work or out of your house.

Tips on how to keep your elderly loved ones safe at home:

- You should remove things which can cause them to fall or to slip like loose wires, rugs and loose electrical cords. Be sure to examine inside the house and to keep away all possible trouble items. Avoid waxing the floor because it could also cause slippage and fall. If you want to make changes on your flooring, replace slippery floors with tacked down carpet.

- Make sure that you have stable handrails in your stairs if you live in a multi-level house with stairs. Investigate and assess if your handrails are not loose or shaky, otherwise, hire a carpenter to fix them immediately and to stabilize all the shaky handrails inside the house.

- Secure your bathrooms and make sure that your showers and bathtubs are slip-proof, otherwise put some bath mats. Install handrails in the showers and bathtubs to help them get in and get out easier.

- Do not put regularly used and necessary items in top shelves to avoid slippage and fall when they are trying to reach them. Make sure to place them just around the corner. If ever you place things on top shelves, be sure to have a step stool in place.

- Make sure that there is adequate lighting in all areas of the house, especially in hallways and in areas which are frequently visited by members of the family. Adequate and proper lighting are needed to elderly individuals who have cataracts and diabetes problems. You can clean your existing lighting fixtures or replace defective bulbs. Place furniture pieces near outlets to ensure that electric cords are hidden. If possible, install additional wiring to limit the distance between the appliance and the outlet. You can also opt for occupancy sensor light switch, a device that automatically turns on when there is movement.

- Be cautious and beware of hazards caused by heating system. Elderly people are highly vulnerable to gas leaks and carbon monoxide poisoning because they spend majority of their time inside the house. To ensure their safety, make sure to have your home checked by professional heating systems technician regularly. Install a carbon monoxide detector inside the home to detect if it is already in its dangerous level. Research shows that carbon monoxide has been the primary cause of accidental deaths among older people.

- Check your furniture pieces regularly and make sure that they are all firm and safe to avoid accidents from happening. Do not give them beds with elevated platforms to prevent falls. Check for any signs of unstable furniture items, like broken legs of chairs. If you spot any furniture defects, have it repaired or have it replaced immediately.

- Make sure to keep toxic products like detergent liquid and chlorine in separate and safe storage areas because of the possibility that they may confuse them with condiments due to their blurred vision.

By following all the tips and suggestions above, you can be sure that your elderly loved ones are safe in your house.

Homer M. Cho enjoys writing for Adultdiaperhub.com which offers adult diapers and incontinence pads as well as a host of additional services.