Helping Your Elderly Parent in a Nursing Home Regain Health After Dehydration or Malnutrition

You may have initially wanted to take care of your elderly parent or relative, but you’ve got too much on your plate already. So you decided to send him or her to a nursing home expecting that your loved one would be taken care of by the staff there. But during one of your visits there, you found out that your elderly parent or relative has suffered from dehydration and malnutrition because of the nursing home staff’s lack of concern for their residents.

You got your loved one out of there and into your own home where he or she can get regain his or her health. Here are some steps to make sure your parent recovers quickly.

1. Make sure that your elderly parent or relative is taking in enough fluids throughout the entire day.

One of the main reasons why some nursing home staff intentionally deprive the said institution’s residents of water is that some older adults can’t control their urinary bladders, and this results in one too many bedwetting incidents. This should not be an excuse at all for nursing home staff to make older adults suffer from dehydration.

• If your elderly parent or relative looked emaciated as a result of the dehydration that they experienced during their stay at the nursing home, you should slowly restore their daily fluid intake and you’ll see their appearance to return to one that’s less weak.
• Every time your elderly parent or relative has to eat, you should place a non-breakable water bottle beside his or her plate so it is easily reachable.
• You should also include soups as well as water-rich fruits and veggies in their diet as supplementary sources of fluids.

1. Cook healthy and nutritious meals for your elderly parent or relative to eat.

Of course, you shouldn’t let your elderly parent or relative subsist on fluids alone unless they can barely chew anything that’s solid.

• You should add lean meat to your elderly parent or relative’s daily diet so that they can get back all the nutrients that they’ve lost during their stay inside a negligent nursing home.
• You should also add whole grains to your elderly parent or relative’s daily diet so that they won’t have any problems regarding their bowel movement.

1. Demand compensation from the nursing home where your elderly parent or relative suffered dehydration and malnutrition.

You sent your elderly parent or relative to a nursing home that was supposed to comply with their duty of care towards all of their residents. As you’ll want them to pay for the dehydration and malnutrition that your elderly parent or relative experienced in their hands, you should make a compensation claim against them with the help of a competent lawyer.

United Kingdom’s National Health Service had stated that nursing home residents are five times more likely to experience dehydration while an Australian newspaper reported in 2013 that one out of every five suffers from malnutrition. It’s disheartening how some nursing homes don’t pay as much attention to their residents, most especially as some of those older adults living in there were once providers themselves who never took basic needs for granted. Now that you’ve gotten your elderly parent or relative out of the nursing home where they suffered from dehydration and malnutrition during their entire stay there, and you should do the above-listed tips to help them get their health back to normal.