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Home » Talking to Your Senior’s Doctor About Their Dietary Restrictions During Diet Resolution Week
Dietary restrictions are extremely common among elderly adults. Doctors often instruct their patients to closely monitor what they eat and limit their consumption of certain ingredients, such as salt or sugar. These restrictions help your aging loved one to manage health issues they are living with it, such as diabetes, congestive heart failure, high blood pressure, and others.
If your senior is heading into the new year with the resolution to eat healthier and possibly lose weight, it is extremely important to keep these dietary restrictions in mind. Even as they are working toward new health and wellness goals, they must keep in mind the importance of nutrition in all aspects of health. This makes talking to their doctor an important step in supporting them as they pursue their goals.
Use these tips to talk to you parent’s doctor about their dietary restrictions to help your senior pursue their health and wellness goals:
Review the restrictions with them to make sure you and your parent fully understand these restrictions. If they have gotten instructions from multiple doctors, be sure to review all of them with each other to make sure no one is contradicting anyone else.
Talk to the doctor about your senior’s goals so they can give input about those goals and what they think your parent should focus on.
Ask for recommendations for foods your senior should eat or those they should try to avoid. This can help you to plan menus and research recipes that work for your parent’s personal tastes and their restrictions.
Consider how to impact more challenging restrictions, such as fluids. Some elderly adults must restrict how much fluid they consume due to health issues such as congestive heart failure. Healthy foods such as fruits and vegetables, however, are often high in fluids. Talk to the doctor about how to handle this balance effectively.
As a family caregiver, you likely had an idea of the types of care efforts you would need to give to your parent as they age. In many situations, however, new and different challenges arise, or you find yourself struggling with the care efforts your parent needs. When this happens, home care is there to help. A home care services provider can be there with your aging parent to manage specific care tasks that are too challenging for you, or that your parent would feel more comfortable with another person handling. This can reduce stress, ease mental and emotional strain, and promote a greater sense of independence and autonomy for your senior.