pill organizers for seniors

    Pill organizers become a necessary part of life when you have at least 20 pills a day to be spread over four pill-taking sessions. There are several sites devoted to these on the Web, or the ubiquitous Amazon.com that really does have quite a complete collection at good rates. The new models with alarms incorporated are fantastic...if you know what you are doing. My sister found two solutions for my mother when we thought she was still capable of taking care of herself: one, a watch with an alarm that would go off four times a day, the other a pill organizer with an alarm in the top that would go off at the appropriate times. The advantage of the watch is that it is always there on your wrist so you can't miss it. The disadvantage is that it requires that you then go and take your pills without forgetting to do so in the interval. For people with short-term memory problems or dementia, this is asking a lot. For the alarm on the pill organizer, since my mother didn't remember what this thing was, she would ignore it. We know now that she never really used these useful tools properly.
     If you have the feeling that your loved one is not taking his/her pills regularly, then I suggest that you get the alarm watch for yourself so that you can call them to check that they are taking their pills. Don't forget: the more aggressive you are ("Did you take your noon pills yet??"), the more you will be told: "Of course, dear" (Mom) or " Of course I did! I'm not stupid!" (Dad). We all know what that means. It's not that they necessarily want to deceive you, it's more that they don't want to disappoint you or admit that they can't handle this sort of thing. Because of her memory problems, my mother is not convinced at all that "all those pills" have anything to do with her very good present health. Because she can't remember that, last fall, she had 5 TIA's and a stroke within two months, she tends to shrug off the pills. If I weren't there to prepare the daily pile and insist on their importance, I know that she wouldn't take them.
   I think it's important to be sensitive to the reality of the situation, it may feel good to find gadget or techno solutions to problems but seniors have trouble keeping up, either for lack of understanding or worse, for lack of interest. That means that the caregivers must furnish the effort, either by being there themselves or by making sure that someone, friend or paid help, is available to check on the medication issue.