Medical alert necklaces can be lifesavers.

18 years ago

I am glad my 90 YO Mom has one since in the past 10 years she has fallen and broken her hip and pelvic. Just found out her 86 YO brother, my favorite uncle, refused to get one being the stubborn man that he is. He fell and broke his hip and laid there for a day before someone found him. He lives on the East Coast and all the relatives there take good care of him and someone had just left right before he fell. He got up from his chair and got dizzy and fell. They wanted to get him a phone by his chair but he didn't want to spend the money. The phone is in the kitchen far away. I can't even imagine what all this is going to cost.

And I hope he makes it through the surgery ok. He has a heart condition and has had a pace maker for over 30 years. Keep him in your prayers and thoughts please. He is the last surviving sibling of my Mom's. She is pretty upset and wishes she could be there but she is in Illinois.

Thanks.

Clare

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Comments (3)

lindyluwho
18 years ago
Just because they have one doesn't mean they will use it. My aunt (87) fell recently. It was around midnight and she just laid on the floor all night. She didn't use the call button because she didn't want to wake the neighbor who has the key!! Actually it was probably 9:30 or later the next day when they called to tell me she had activated the call button. Fortunately she wasn't hurt, just couldn't get up. Stubborn old woman.

Linda
czech_chick
18 years ago
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Sad story alert. DH's mother lived for awhile in one of those residence centers for old people. all the old ladies had their various pendants and bracelets though the place had panic buttons and pulls here and there. One of the few old guys made fun of all the ladies, picking on them unmercifully for wasting money. He fell in his shower and somehow got wedged in and couldn't get out. He couldn't reach a cord apparently and when they finally found him it was too late. The shower had been on the whole time. All the old ladies congratulated themselves. We used two different systems for her but they change so quickly and this has been a few years so I wont suggest. She did use hers three times.
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joyfulguy
18 years ago
Hi Clare,

Yes, independent (especially male) old folks are like that.

I hope that your uncle's problems can be alleviated shortly and with little complications. Tell him that someone should have hit him over the head with a 2" X 4"!

Old uncle wouldn't wear one of those aid-summoning buttons until a few months before his death.

I've suggested here (and elsewhere) that folks prone to have a medical problem that would confine them to the floor should have a phone on a cord on a chair-side/bedside table, or somewhere similar, that they could pull down to where they could use it ... that one three feet up on a wall might as well be on another planet.

As for the summonsing call-buttons, probably better if one can have two or three respondents, at least one younger, if possible, who wouldn't mind being roused at 3 a.m.

But, then .. this old fart, near 80, isn't even considering having one of those call buttons on his wrist.

(He does have three phones on cords, able to be dragged to the floor, though [but only two are plugged in - he needs a splitter to make the third operational]).

No cell phone to carry around with him, either.

Old folks feel the walls closing in ... and keep trying to push them back.

I've had a licence to drive a fairly heavy straight truck, and delayed taking some of my required tests a while ago, with a view to preserving that licence, following eye repairs ... but, as some said ... "How many large trucks are you figuring on driving ... at age 79?".

Pushing those walls back - even though I'm, fortunately, able-bodied, not physically (or, I hope, mentally) restricted. (We won't go into the emotional end).

I hope that your uncle can regain his former health.

ole joyful

Medical alert necklaces can be lifesavers.

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lindyluwho

czech_chick

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