How To Make Your Home Safer For Older Parents

As our parents get older, it might be that the best course of action is to have them move in with you – it’s a hard decision and it means a lot of changes and even some sacrifice, but it can also be the best thing to ensure they stay safe and happy. The thing to remember is that although you and they might feel it’s an ideal solution, it’s not always going to be a matter of them just picking up their things and walking through your front door and it’s done – there’s a lot more to consider than that. 

One of the things you’ll need to consider is whether or not your home is actually safe for older parents. After all, just because you don’t have an issue with the layout and so on, that doesn’t mean someone who might not be one hundred percent steady on their feet or who can’t see or hear all that well wouldn’t. In fact, your home might not be safe at all, and your plan to keep your parents protected in their old age could backfire. With that in mind, here are some tips on how to make your home safer for older parents. 

Install Handrails 

If you’ve got older parents coming to live with you, you need to think about their mobility – as we get older, we become more unstable as we move around, and if your parents have additional health issues (including any cognitive problems like dementia), that can make things even worse. So when they’re in your home, there’s a big risk they might fall and hurt themselves, as since older bones are more brittle, they break more easily and it takes a lot longer for them to heal – it can be surprising to learn that a broken hip could be fatal if you’re older, for example. 

To prevent falls as much as possible, installing handrails and grab bars in your home is a great idea. Put them up staircases and install them in bathrooms as a priority, but also look around to see if there’s anywhere else they might be useful. Grab bars near a toilet or shower can also be a good idea as that’s going to prevent accidents but also help your older parents stay more independent. 

Make The Bedroom Safe

Depending on your own life and what you do, you might be with your older parents a lot of the time, so you can make sure they’re okay and not in any danger. However, one place (other than the bathroom, which we’ve already mentioned) you might not spend much time with them is in their bedroom – after all, they’re going to need a space of their own if they’re going to be happy and comfortable while they’re living with you; it’s something everyone needs, no matter how old they might be. 

That means you need to ensure that your parent’s bedroom is safe and secure and that they won’t come to any harm while they’re in there by themselves. It’s important to check that there aren’t any obstacles in the way of them moving about freely, and you should also check the height of the bed – too high or too low can be a problem, so it needs to be just right. Install some bedside lamps or, even better, motion-activated lights so they don’t have to move around in the dark, and as we mentioned above, handrails can be a wise choice by the bed as well. 

Hire In-Home Care

As much as you might want to, sometimes it’s just not possible to do everything that’s needed to help aging parents – you’ll have work, perhaps your own family to be with, not to mention needing to take breaks from time to time because otherwise you’re just going to burn out and be of no use to anyone, let alone your parents or yourself. So what’s the answer? 

Since you can’t do everything alone, it’s a good idea to hire in-home help to give you some assistance – that’s particularly useful if your older parents need a lot of help with everyday things, but even if they just need some medical care and some company from time to time, it’s still not a bad idea. When you’re choosing a caregiver, make sure they’re properly trained and have plenty of experience, and make sure they’ve undergone background checks too, just to be on the safe side. You can work with the carer to come up with a plan that suits everyone, and you can have peace of mind that your older parents are in safe hands even if you can’t always be there.