Home Safety Month is coming up in June…

Take the opportunity now to furnish your referral network with home safety information.

Home Safety Month is good time to educate seniors on the importance of eliminating environmental hazards that could interrupt their long-term independence. While heart disease & cancer may be the leading causes of adult death in the United States, falls are the number one cause of injury related deaths for adults 65 and older.

Some accidents can be avoided with a little preparation and an in-home fall prevention assessment. This is a proactive approach to help older adults age in place by having their living environment evaluated for safety and ease of use. The Home Health community is an excellent resource for providing this service. Some common factors that can increase fall risk include:

• Medical impairment                       
• Muscle Weakness
• Poor Vision                                        
• Inadequate Lighting
• Improper Footwear                       
• Obstructed or Uneven Surfaces

Tips for safeguarding against falls:

• Remove tripping hazards like pet toys, throw rugs and cords.
• Declutter and create plenty of walking space.
• Use non-skid mats, hand rails and grab bars in the bathroom.
• Install railings on both sides of stairs and apply anti-slip treads to each step.
• Provide adequate lighting in every room and place night lights in halls and stairways.
• Make often-used items accessible without the use of a step stool or ladder.
• If necessary, use personal walking devices, such as a cane or walker, to aid in stability.

For more information on Fall Prevention visit the National Council on Aging website:  https://www.ncoa.org/healthy-aging/falls-prevention/

How you can participate:

• Visit your local senior care providers and supply them with informational brochures for their patients and caregivers.
• Distribute fall prevention information to local worship communities and offer to teach a class on safeguarding against avoidable in-home accidents.
• Arrange for your Occupational Therapists to lead a discussion group at senior centers in your area. Have them emphasize the importance of maintaining muscle strength and how low impact exercise and basic daily activities can improve mobility. Be sure to have plenty of swag on hand to distribute to the attendees.

For more ideas on branded Marketing materials visit our Web Store: www.tagwebstore.com

Focus on senior safety at home this August

August gives us all a great opportunity to focus on an important topic we should all think more about: home safety.

While as home care professionals, a great deal of our time and effort is spent ensuring our clients are living as safely and healthfully as possible at home, there is much more we can do to not only enhance our services but promote the idea of home safety throughout our communities.

National Safe at Home Week is Aug. 20-26. Use this observance as a catalyst to jump-start your safety efforts. Here are some tips to help you get started.

• Educate seniors in your community about some of the most common and avoidable dangers lurking in their homes. Host a series of seminars at a local senior center with topics such as emergency preparedness, help for those with hearing difficulties, poison prevention, home fire safety, and more. Find some great information to help you lead the discussion at the CDC’s website for Home and Recreational Safety.
• Few things can land a senior in the hospital faster than a fall. Volunteer to teach a senior class on fall prevention at a local adult day care center. TAG Partners offers a ready-made class on fall prevention, complete with script, promotional posters, and presentation flyers for attendees all personalized to your agency. Call 866-232-6477 for information on individual component pricing.
• Hand out personalized first aid kits or potholders to your senior community along with your agency’s marketing brochure and an offer for a free home safety evaluation. Call TAG Partners at 866-232-6477 to explore the promotional product options available to you.
• Partner with your local fire department in providing fire safety education to your community. Get started by checking out the US Fire Administration’s helpful Fire Safe Seniors Tool Kit. It includes tons of handouts, posters and other items to help you deliver an effective presentation.
• Talk to your local radio station about hosting a monthly show about seniors and home safety. There is a wealth of topics to cover, such as preventing falls/balance issues, planning for a disaster, home health care safety, Internet/personal safety, fraud prevention, etc.

Here’s a great community marketing opportunity

It’s time to focus on fall prevention, medication safety and home safety. June is National Safety Month, an observance sponsored by the National Safety Council. Help raise awareness about home safety and how improving safety measures can help adults age where they want to age: at home.

• Most bone fractures among older adults result from falls. Volunteer to teach a class on fall prevention at your area’s adult day care centers. Find a ready-made class here. Distribute branded promotional items such as nightlights to assist seniors in their fall prevention efforts. Call 866-232-6477 to learn more about the many promotional items available to you.
• Host a senior home safety program at a local church that addresses safety and older adults. Topics can include preventing a home invasion, protecting against scammers who prey on seniors, and making the home less likely to be a location for accidents. Invite your local police, an alarm company representative, and a financial safety expert to participate. Make sure your agency is the expert speaking about fall prevention and home safety. Promote the fact that your agency can come into the home for a free safety evaluation.
• Distribute flyers about home safety and medication safety to the waiting rooms of the offices of general practitioners in your area.
• Visit area senior centers and take along a sample disaster supplies kit. Educate attendees on the importance of such a kit and what should go in one. These kits are essential in case of fire, flood, earthquake, tornado or other disaster. Find a recommended supply list and other information here.
• Lend your agency’s public support to an injury-reducing safety initiative, such as improved lighting in parking areas.
• Partner with a local pharmacist for a medication awareness event at a local library. Educate seniors about medication safety and the need to talk to their pharmacist about all their medications, both prescription and over-the-counter. Visit the website for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention for information about older adults and drugs. Download, print and distribute to participants the My Medicine Record provided by the FDA.

June 2015: Celebrate and Educate

Happy birthday to you! Medicare turns 50 years old this July 30. Take part in the celebration of the national social insurance program for older adults. About 55.3 million Americans were covered by Medicare in 2013, and the figure is expected to rise as Baby Boomers continue reaching retirement age.

• Offer your patients a tool that will go everywhere they do. Give them a protective sleeve for their Medicare card that already includes a card with your agency’s name and contact information. It will keep their Medicare card safe and make it easy to refer to you when it’s time for home care. Find it at www.tagwebstore.com/medicare-sleeve.php/.

• Host a class at your local library to help acquaint people in your community with Medicare. Be sure to also tell them about Medicare’s covered home care or hospice benefits and how your agency can help. Find a ready-made class at www.tagwebstore.com/healthmatters-education-series.php.

• Make sure your physician referral sources have an easy way to know what Medicare-covered services are available to their patients and Medicare’s conditions for payment. The physician pocket guide to Medicare tells them at a glance the services your agency provides and includes your telephone number for easy referral. Find it at www.tagwebstore.com/pocket-guide-to-medicare.php.

There’s no mistaking that summer is here. It may be a quiet time when it comes to healthcare observances, but there still are plenty of ways you can keep your marketing efforts current.

We celebrate the independence of our nation on July 4, but it’s also a great time to celebrate the independence seniors in your community are maintaining with the help of family, friends and agencies like yours. Here are some things you can do to reach out to this vibrant community.

• Visit local senior centers and distribute Senior Fun Packs, which include playing cards and bingo cards personalized with your agency’s logo and contact information. This outreach out to those who are maintaining social activities such as senior center participation will pay off with enhanced awareness of your agency. Find the Senior Fun Packs at www.tagwebstore.com/seniorfunpack.php.

• Experts agree that one of the best ways to maintain mental acuity (and prolong independence) is by completing puzzles. Connect with seniors and raise awareness of your agency with puzzle books personalized with your logo and contact information. Display them in referral source waiting rooms. Find them at www.tagwebstore.com/puzzlebook.php.

• Plan a Fourth of July-themed event to celebrate the independence of your community’s seniors that also will help prolong their independence and increase your referrals. In addition to a light luncheon featuring ice cream, hot dogs and other summer treats, provide informative booths and educate attendees about an important Medicare benefit they may not realize they have: The Annual Wellness Visit, which includes a review of medical history and risk factors, and a personalized prevention plan. Have a clinician on-hand to perform the annual exams. Find a kit to help you plan and execute the event here: www.tagwebstore.com/annual-wellness-visit-kit.php.

Sandwich Generation Month takes place this July. Join thousands of organizations and communities around the country in recognizing and raising awareness about the Sandwich Generation – the generation of adults who are caring for their children as well as their aging parents. Learn more about it at the sponsor organization’s website www.sandwichgenerationmonth.com/.

• Take part in community health fairs this month and stress the importance of supporting these caregivers. Have plenty of agency marketing brochures on hand. Find them at www.tagwebstore.com/marketing-brochures.php and www.tagwebstore.com/faq-brochures.php.

• Sign up to speak about the sandwich generation at the community meetings of various local elected officials and local community groups. Educate them about how your agency can help those with a variety of conditions and ease the burden on their caregivers. Find disease-specific flyers at www.tagwebstore.com/health-care-flyers.php.

• Visit with your referral sources and stress the assistance your agency can provide family caregivers when a loved one has a serious illness or injury. Show them that one of the tools in your caregiving arsenal is zone flyers, which help improve positive outcomes. Find them at www.tagwebstore.com/zone-flyer.php.

May 2015: Look out for your community’s men

June is the perfect time to show a little love to the men in our lives. After all, June is Men’s Health Month and National Men’s Health Week is June 15-21, 2015. And we can’t forget about Father’s Day on June 21. Stand up for the men in your community and remind them that when they improve their health, they improve not only their own lives, but the lives of everyone they care about. Focus efforts this month on educating about health issues that particularly affect men. Consider this: According to the Centers for Disease Control, women are twice as likely as men to visit the doctor for annual exams and preventive services.

• Take part in community health fairs this month and hand out flyers about topics such as prostate cancer, high blood pressure, medication management and pain management. Find them www.tagwebstore.com/health-care-flyers.php.
• Heart disease is the leading cause of death in the United States, killing 307,225 men in 2009 – one in every four deaths! Volunteer to teach a free class on heart health at a local Lions Club, Kiwanis Club or VFW.  Find a ready-made class at www.tagwebstore.com/healthmatters-education-series.php.
• About 67 million American adults (one-third of the population!) have high blood pressure, a condition that contributes to heart attack, stroke and heart failure. Distribute blood pressure logs to the offices of general practitioners and internists to give to their patients with elevated blood pressure. The logs provide a consistent way to get attention for your agency while helping potential patients manage their condition. Find them at www.tagwebstore.com/bloodpressurelog.php.
• It’s time to think about doing something big. Plan an event to educate your community’s men (and women) about an important Medicare benefit they may not realize they have: The Annual Wellness Visit, which includes a review of medical history and risk factors and a personalized prevention plan. Provide snacks, informative booths and access to a clinician to perform the annual exams. Find a kit to help you plan and execute the event here: www.tagwebstore.com/annual-wellness-visit-kit.php.

Taking steps to ensure safety at home can mean a world of difference to seniors hoping to maintain their independence. June’s National Home Safety Month is a great time to help. Get ready to reach out to your community and educate on home safety and how your agency can help. The National Safety Council-supported observance is an effort to educate people and influence their behaviors in relation to the top causes of preventable death and injury. Here are some things you can do to participate.

• Host a free educational class at your area senior centers on the importance and basics of fall prevention. Find a ready-made class at www.tagwebstore.com/healthmatters-education-series.php.
• Show your referral sources this month that you are committed to ensuring patient safety. Integrate patient education guides for fall prevention into your services for those at an elevated risk for a fall. The guides also are an eye-catching tool you can use to show referral sources how seriously you take this issue. Find them at www.tagwebstore.com/patient-education-guides.php.
• Health and safety go hand in hand. Give patients a powerful tool to track their health records, including medications, immunizations, blood sugar and more. Health Logs will go everywhere they go and will keep your agency top of mind. Distribute them to your both your clients and prospective clients. Find them at www.tagwebstore.com/healthlog.php.
• Stock physician waiting rooms – especially those of orthopedic specialists – with flyers about home safety. Be sure to include information about your agency’s fall risk assessments. Find the flyers at www.tagwebstore.com/health-care-flyers.php.

Advances in technology and treatment options mean people diagnosed with cancer have better odds of survival than ever. Join the cancer community in celebrating life after a cancer diagnosis this National Cancer Survivors Day on June 7, 2015. Show your support for increased cancer education while also educating people about ways home care can help.

• Remind physicians that palliative care isn’t just for patients who are terminal. Sit down with physicians and remind them that all patients battling cancer can benefit from palliative care. Leave behind an informative brochure about this specialized care and how your agency can help. Find it HERE. (Bonus: All brochures at www.tagwebstore.com are Buy 1 Get 1 FREE through the May 31!)
• Home care agencies should provide oncologists with brochures that discuss the benefits of home care for cancer patients. Find them at www.tagwebstore.com/disease-information-brochures.php.
• Contact the local office of the American Cancer Society and offer to organize a bake sale, sidewalk sale or other charity event to benefit the organization. Be sure to have plenty of informative materials available that educate about cancer. Find personalized agency flyers about cancer at www.tagwebstore.com/health-care-flyers.php.
• Give cancer patients a comprehensive guide to assist them as they cope with treatment. Find a patient education guide for cancer with chemotherapy/radiation at www.tagwebstore.com/patient-education-guides.php.