InFocus featuring Sarah Aasheim (Access Care Partners)

From the 22 News Plus Studio, this is 22 News In Focus with Patrick Berry. Hello everyone and welcome to this edition of In Focus. I am your host Patrick Berry. If Alzheimer's and dementia has not affected your family, I hate to say it, but it probably will at some point. Many of us and many of you watching probably have a family member, a loved one, a friend, a co-worker, whatever it might be that you spend a lot of time with who's starting to lose their memory. But there is a lot of help out there for not only the person who might be in the throes of dementia or Alzheimer's, but also for the family that they are the primary caregivers. I'm excited today because joining me across the desk from Access Care Partners is Sarah Aschheim. She is their Director of Community Programs, a wonderful, wonderful woman who I've gotten to know over the course of the last few years. So I've invited her in here to talk not clinically about dementia and Alzheimer's, but more of how you and I as family members and caregivers have to battle and go through those everyday issues of a loved one losing their memory. So Sarah, thanks for joining me. I appreciate it. Thank you, Patrick. You're on the front lines. You see family members and not the patient, but the family members, and I'm very bluntly, at their wit's end, right? So you're part counselor, part, you know, guider to proper services. That has to be a difficult role that you're in. Just, you see the angst on these family members. How do you get through your every single day? It's a great place to start, Patrick. And I think, you know, when I hear that you asked that question, I think about sort of my response as my role, but also our role as an organization, you know, and I think I'd probably lead with that because, you know, we have incredibly talented staff at Access Care Partners who, you know, are clinically trained to really understand the caregiving experience. And so who, you know, they are really well prepared to help meet caregivers where they're at, you know, and when I then sort of shift to think about my own experience, I have personal and professional experience, you know, like I'm interfacing with caregivers. I myself am a family caregiver. Most people are, you know, at one stage or another of their lives. And so certainly my approach to this professionally is informed by my personal experience and, you know, what you said about really caregiver exhaustion. It's a common denominator and that is not to take away that caregiving is really an act of love, you know. You know, and I'm not going to say the rumor, the sort of thing that I constantly hear fairly regularly is the caregiver's health usually gets ignored, put aside, but that becomes an issue because ignored and put aside because they're dealing with their family member with whatever ails them, that the caregiver's health goes downhill. Is that true? Really is. I mean, when you think about it, it's almost logical because the caregiver has to rearrange a lot of their own sort of priorities in order to meet the care needs of their care recipient, you know, and that's kind of, it's dynamic, you know, a care recipient's needs of family members, that care recipient sounds a little bit clinical, but really a family member who needs care, their needs change over time. And so the caregiver, the family caregiver is sort of constantly pivoting to meet those needs. In order to do that, they make a lot of sacrifices, you know, that includes financial sacrifices, you know, to meet their loved one's needs. Often that means that caregivers who previously had been working in the workforce had had a job, had had a career, sometimes they have to leave that job and career. So not only does that mean they sacrifice a potential opportunity for themselves, but it's income, it's financial resources. And then, you know, when they're providing care, their care, their loved one's needs always come first. I think for the caregiver, that's a very common mindset. And so what's left at the end of the day, when they've had a very full day of meeting their loved one's needs, isn't a lot often. And so they will sacrifice their own, you know, care, whether that means seeking medical care for their physical needs, for their mental health needs. I mean, it's, it's, it kind of compounds. You know, it's, it's funny when, before my mom passed, one of my sisters was, was her primary caregiver and she was trying to balance work and my mom and caring for my mom and all of that. And, you know, I look at that and she gave up vacations, you know, just, you know, her physical health, I don't think went downhill, but her mental health was like, you know, so, you know, it's sad to see your parent pass, but I think for my sister kind of saved her, you know what I mean? Yeah. No. And do you see that kind of across the Sure. I think that one of the things that we recognize, you know, if you've had the lived experience of being a caregiver, or if you work in this world, you recognize that, well, we don't want, we don't want to wait for, or wish for our loved ones to pass away in order to realize that relief. Right. So we really need to find ways to build in relief for caregivers. That's, that's daily and that's more accessible. And, you know, that allows them to keep the oxygen mask on. You've heard that, you know, pretty great when you think about it, when you're on an airplane and you know, hopefully this has never happened, but like when the captain or the flight attendants coach you through it and what happens in an emergency, the, um, the air masks dropped down and they say, you got to put yours on yourself before you put it on anybody else. Right. So I think really that metaphor applies really beautifully to caregivers, which is like, you're right. I never even thought of that. Yeah. Put that care, put that mask on yourself, get the oxygen you need, get the energy you need in order to stabilize yourself. So then, then you can put the mask on everybody else around you. Like if you don't do that, you know, to play it out, you're going to run out of air and you won't be able to help them at all. I love that because that really, cause everybody, I shouldn't say everybody, most people have flown and most people have heard that speech and it makes perfect sense. You know, you have to take care of yourself before you can take care of others is really what it boils down to. It does. It resonates. We are going to take a commercial break right now, but when we come back, we're going to learn more about Access Care Partners and how they can help you. If you are a caregiver, stay with us. We're back in just a minute. This is 22 News In Focus with Patrick Berry. This is 22 News In Focus with Patrick Berry. Welcome back everyone to this edition of In Focus. I'm your host, Patrick Berry sitting across the desk from me from Access Care Partners is Sarah Ashram. Sarah, thanks for coming in. I appreciate you giving me some of your time. You know, we talked, we talked in the first block, really focused on dementia care. I want to talk now about what Access Care Partners does, but does it only focus on memory care patients or is it patients from like all medical field, medical issues? Sure. Yeah. It's much more broadly defined the population of individuals that we serve, right? So it's not just people with Alzheimer's or dementia. It is not just older adults either. We certainly serve the majority, I'd say of the consumers that we serve are older adults, but we serve younger folks as well. We have a couple of programs that allow us to do that. You know, caregivers, family caregivers are caregiving across the life continuum, if you will. So we want to make sure that we're providing support as well to, you know, people that have, let's say a loved one with an intellectual disability at home who can't be home by themselves. That's just where I was thinking. I was thinking, you know, maybe a child with severe autism or a child who can't care for themselves that the parent becomes the primary caregiver. So it's all, all ages. It's not just dementia care. It's not, it's all ages. And it's really like a really wide sort of range of, of needs. So we, we are able to support these caregivers in a number of different ways. We have a family support or excuse me, family caregiver specialist and her name is Monica Crespo. And Monica is very highly trained and skilled to understand the lived experience of caregivers. She can meet with them and offer counseling and resources and referrals. She knows what resources are in the community to help these caregivers. She is able to provide, we are able to provide as an agency, some small, but I think meaningful grants that help caregivers either access respite care so they can take a little break or sometimes purchase a piece of equipment that will give them peace of mind. You know, I have to imagine that family care specialist, is that the title? Yes. Crucial element because, you know, that person specializes in knowing what's out there, whereas the family members specialize in knowing what the care is, but they may not have the ability to understand all the sources that are out there. And that's where this person comes into play. Yeah, absolutely. So that like really, we envision that it's a partnership, you know, we're able to bring that information about community resources to our consumers and that they know their loved one best, just as you say. So, you know, we need to learn from them about what their loved one's needs are and how we can help support them meet those needs. So how does that work? So if I've been caring for a loved one, do I just call you guys up and go, I need some help? How does the process work? Yeah, it's as simple as that. You know, we ask, yep. We tell folks if they're interested in learning about us and we always encourage people to do that before the need is acute, you know, like just do some research and find out what supports are in place should you need care at one point. So yeah, they just call us up or they can contact us through our website. So is the best time to call you as you start to recognize that this particular loved one's going to need help soon? Now I'm going to call or get in touch with you and say, okay, this is what I'm up against. I've, you know, I've got a, whatever, pick it, yeah. We often say, know us before you need us. Okay. So at your, to your point, it's, you know, we coach people to say, even before you even start to recognize maybe some mild signs of cognitive impairment or mild signs of other types of needs, you know, just think about what you would need. Should someone in your family become, you know, acquire a disability or have an extra level of need that you can't meet by yourself. Start to do that homework now, because if you're then, if you don't, and then you reach a moment in need, say it's your older adult that you're caring for and they fall and they break a hip and they go to the hospital, then they can't come back home without a lot of support. And then it's an immediacy need. Then it's like, I need to know where my mom or dad was going tomorrow. Right. Yeah. So you're better off knowing that weeks in advance, months in advance if possible, years in advance, know us before you need us. You know, I have to imagine it's human nature not to do that advance, you know, because you don't, you don't know, you don't know what you don't know. That's right. You know, but the, you know, I mean, again, I bring up my family. My mom did, she fell and broke her hip and it was like, no, what do we do? Right. You know, but we wouldn't have known that until that moment. No. And we avoid, I mean, let's face it, it's human, right? We avoid thinking about right. You know, we like to think we're immortal. I mean, there's signs that we are not over time, but you know it's hard to sort of face some of those difficult tasks that come along with growing older, which is like, like thinking about your, your will, your estate, or, you know, what kind of care needs you're going to have. You guys offer advice on that too? Wills, estates, like who to talk to? We don't, but we have resources in the community that we connect people with. Yeah, we do. That makes sense. Yep. Yep. So I wanted to talk to him if I can, can I share a little bit more about some of our programs? So we have a couple more programs for caregivers. I just want your listeners to know about one is called adult family care. This is a mass health funded program. So it's not for everyone, but for recipients that have mass health it allows their caregiver to, if they're approved for the program to receive a small, but I think significant stipend, a monthly stipend. Most caregivers, again, if they have to care for their loved one full time, they have to leave a job. They sacrifice income. That stipend can help offset some of that financial impact. There's that. And then we also have a new program back to Alzheimer's and dementia. We have a program called guide. And that is a program specifically for Medicare recipients, Medicare parts a and B to be specific. It's not for folks have Medicare advantage plans. Uh, but for those who qualify, this provides also some approved up to, I think, um, $2,600 annually for respite care, as well as some other supports and resources. So we encourage people who have a loved one that needs support and they themselves as caregiver needs support. We encourage them to call us and find out more about these programs. All right. And as, uh, as we're talking, I'm going to pull up the website. There it is access care partners.org. And that's where folks can learn. They can learn about all the programs. There are referral forms right on the website that can link us, link them to our, um, information and referral team. They can give us a call as well. And again, if this is, it's not just a mention, um, and memory care issues, it's whatever. Right. Right. It's, it's really like, if you have a loved one that needs care, call us. Okay. Is there a cost? So do we pay, like, if I need help and I need, I need access care partners, do I pay you to help me? The, the programs that I've discussed today, if you qualify for those programs, so the family caregiver support program is funded through some federal dollars. And, uh, so that is a program that basically the agency pays for. And we provide that service to consumers and to caregivers at no cost. Um, the, uh, guide program is for those who qualify for those who qualify. There's no additional out-of-pocket costs, the, um, AFC program, adult family care, same thing or mass health recipients and their caregivers. Um, there are no additional costs. I know with a lot of, um, agencies right now, there's a backlog just because there's such a need out there. Yeah. If somebody reaches out to you today, what's the response? Like, is it, do I have to wait weeks to get to hear back from somebody or how's that work? No, no, we, we pride ourselves in being able to turn those referrals quickly and our, um, intake and referral team. They make sure that they can set an intake appointment with one of our care managers to get the process going. In the case of talking about caregiver services, they make the referral to our family caregiver specialist who can go out and triage and say, what program do we have that best meets your needs? Very good. All right, folks, we are up on our second commercial break. Stay with us. Plenty more to talk about. We're back in just a minute. This is 22 news in focus with Patrick Berry. This is 22 news in focus with Patrick Berry. Hello everyone. And welcome back to this edition of in focus. I'm your host Patrick Berry. I'm excited today because joining me across the desk from, uh, access care partners is Sarah Ashheim. Sarah, thank you so very much for joining me today. Uh, we've been talking a lot about what access care partners does. Um, you know, and I think for the bulk of this conversation, it was more of, I don't want to say the immediate need of help, but it's sort of what there's, there's a growing population of middle-aged people. Yeah. I hate to say it, but we fall into that category. Um, the sandwich generation, that's the word I was looking for. The sandwich generation where you've got kids that you're trying to deal with and you've got older adult parents that you're trying to deal with. Do, do you guys have seminars? Do you have open, uh, presentations where people in that sandwich generation can kind of get a heads up of, this is what I'm in for. Yeah. I'm so happy you brought up the demographic. I'm going to speak to that for just a second and then answer your question. Uh, so demographically, absolutely. You know, we have a rapidly aging population, right? So that's true across the country. It's true. I think, especially here in Massachusetts, um, here in Massachusetts currently, I believe 27% of our total population is adults over age 60 and that's ahead of the national average. So that does put it in perspective. Uh, so we, you know, have, we've known that that's been happening. You know, we've been told for a long time that the boomers, the baby boomers are reaching a retirement age and that demographic shift is going to be very consequential for service providers when it happens. Well, it's happening. It will be here. That wave will be here for the next 15 years. So then it's incumbent on us as service providers to think, okay, how can we educate the community about how all of us can be prepared for and meet the needs of our aging population and be supportive to caregivers that are providing care at home. Everybody wants to age at home, right? You know, whether you have a disability, whether you're growing older, nobody says, I want to, you know, get older and then go into a nursing home. So that's our end goal all the time. And our education, it happens a couple of different ways. One is it's education that, um, that happens in conversations that we have with our legislative leaders. We talk to our state reps and senators. We advocate to our federal leaders as well to talk about these demographics and, and, you know, educate them about why we need their investment in home and community-based services, which costs a lot less. They cost the state and they cost the country a lot less to invest in than nursing home placements or recurrent hospitalization. Exactly. So there's that education. Community education is also critical. And yes, we do host events. Uh, we are really sort of becoming more strategic, I would say, about making sure we're hosting events in the community that educate folks about the experience, um, educate folks about what supports we have in place to offer caregivers and how, as a community, we can collectively support services that nonprofits offer. You know, we don't just depend on federal and state grants. We need the community to invest in our services so that we can keep meeting caregivers' needs. So I guess the, the, the call to action, I guess, for our viewers and the folks watching this is just keep going to the website. Keep checking because periodically throughout the year, you may have exactly what somebody's looking for. It might be, where do you, where do you do these? Do you, do you have a facility or do you like to South Hadley public library or West Springfield auditorium, high school auditorium or something like that? We have one, we have an event coming up this fall. That's going to be at Loomis. It's co-hosted by Loomis communities in South Hadley. So it's not strictly one place, but you know, we're happy to be partnering with them. We really look to facilities that are accessible, you know, and that are in our service area. So that will vary, but you know, as you say, please you know, go to our website. We encourage your readers, your listeners to go to our website and to see what events we have coming up and to see how they can help support us on a monetary level. If they're inclined to donate, we always accept those donations. Those donations are channeled to our programs and they immediately support caregivers and consumers. So we've talked about the family as being the caregiver. Are there, like, do you guys employ people who are caregivers or, you know, or do you, you maybe, maybe not you guys specifically, but you work with another agency that that's what they do is they have people to come to your house and help you. Yes. A couple of ways that we do this. We do have a network of provider agencies that do the in-home care. So we will contract with them to provide that caregiving support and other home care based support in the home. So we kind of work that through. And you'd be surprised what's out there for help. Yes. It's incredible. And then we also, there are programs I mentioned, AFC or adult family care. I'll mention that again, because that is a way for us to compensate someone who's already in a caregiving role. Often it's those who are family caregivers and can get a little bit of compensation to continue to provide care for their loved one. I mean, it's their preference to be able to provide the care themselves. Typically it's their loved one, the care recipients preference that it's a family member providing the care. So that's a win-win. So in that world, that's not, is, is there a demand for people like, you know, cause I know a lot of people are looking for work, you know, so are there, are there career opportunities in those fields? Yes, absolutely. You know, I'd say globally, I will say that there are lots of opportunity for care providing roles in organizations and agencies like ours that have direct service roles. We have care managers, we have other sort of support roles that are direct consumer facing. And, you know, while I'm not going to pretend I know exactly what's posted on our website right now, but again, I always encourage people who are interested in helping professions and would like to look at, you know, a career in this kind of direct service work. It's extremely gratifying. It's not easy, but it's extremely gratifying. I encourage people to look at our website for that as well, because we always post our volunteer and our employment opportunities there. So, and you've mentioned volunteer a few times. And it's funny, I know some folks who are retired and they're just, they're looking to stay busy. So what does a volunteer, what do you, what do you look for in volunteers? Well, for our agency, we look for individuals that have the flexibility to help with a couple different programs. So, you know, a real good entry point for anyone who's interested. A lot of folks know about our Meals on Wheels program. Area agencies on aging, like Access Care Partners, usually all have a Meals on Wheels program. We deliver anywhere between 11 and 1200 meals every day to folks in their homes. Every day. Every day. Yeah. And so we love to invite volunteers to come join our Meals on Wheels delivery team. That's a wonderful way for them to learn about our programs and to see an immediate impact. They deliver that meal every day often. And I've said this, I've probably said this when you and I've talked before, but they're not just delivering a meal. They are often the only person that sees that person every day. So it's a really important safety check. It's a quick conversation. Hey, and it's also good for the volunteer. How you doing? You know, and you know, Hey, you know, I'm making it up, Bob, you know, on whatever main street needs help, you know, he's not, not doing so well. That's right. Yeah, that's right. And, you know, if you bring it back to the caregiver, imagine the peace of mind that that gives a family caregiver when they know, you know, say they're not close enough that they can't check on mom or dad every day, but they know that their trusty Meals on Wheels driver is going to see them every day. And it's going to let them know it's going to, by virtue of, you know, if there is a problem, they'll report it back to our staff. And if there's something to report, we'll be in touch with the emergency contact or the family provider. It's immense peace of mind for family caregivers to know that that's a place. Fantastic. I'm going to bring up the website one more time, folks. There it is, accesscarepartners.org. Sarah, I can't thank you enough for joining me today. This is a fantastic conversation. Thank you, Patrick. It's a whole world out there that I had no idea about. Happy to come back anytime. Thanks so much for being curious.