Ensuring your senior parent takes their medications correctly is crucial to their health and wellbeing. However, managing your senior’s medications can be challenging. Here we offer ten tips to make medication management for seniors simpler.

1. Keep a Detailed Medication List:
   Document all prescribed and over-the-counter medications, noting the name, dosage, frequency, and the prescribing doctor for each one. This list should be kept up to date and shared with all health care providers.
2. Use a Pill Organizer:
   Pill organizers can simplify the process of managing multiple medications by providing a visual guide for daily doses, ensuring no medications are missed or taken twice. Be sure to review the logic behind each type of pill organizer so that it matches with your loved ones medicine routine. For example, if your parent needs to take one pill per day in the morning, there are organizers that have a single compartment just for that time and day. If your parent needs to take a pill Morning, Noon and Evening each day of the week, there are organizers that have three compartments each color coded for each day of the week. You can see the range of pill organizers here on amazon (NOT an affiliate link)
3. Set Timely Reminders:
   Use alarms or reminders on a phone or clock to help remember when it’s time to take medications. Be sure that your loved one knows how to turn off the reminder alarm without resetting it.
4. Review Medications Regularly:
   Regularly review medications with your senior parent’s healthcare provider, ensuring that all are still necessary and that there are no adverse interactions.
5. Understand Each Medication:
   Understand why each medication is prescribed, what it does, and potential side effects. Be sure that family members and your loved one understands these medications. This knowledge can empower seniors to manage their medications more effectively.
6. Establish a Routine:
   Incorporate medication-taking into daily routines, such as taking pills with meals, to make it less likely that a dose is forgotten. Generally if you can connect their medication taking with a specific routine they enjoy, they will be more likely to remember it. For example if they love to do a daily crossword puzzle in the morning.
7. Use Pharmacy Delivery Services:
   Many pharmacies offer home delivery services for prescriptions, making it easier to keep medications stocked and up to date.
8. Keep Medications in a Safe, Accessible Place:
   Store medications in a location that is easily accessible for the senior, yet out of reach for children or pets, and away from heat and moisture. Be sure that your senior is able to open the medication(s)! Some medicine child safety features are also very senior safety as well!
9. Communicate With Care Providers:
   Maintain open communication with healthcare providers and caregivers to address any concerns or changes regarding medications.
10. Consider In-Home Care Support:
    Professional caregivers, like those from Seniors Helping Seniors, can provide medicine reminders and assist in managing medications. We do not administer medications only assist by following your and or your doctors directions as to when to take them.

Managing your senior parent’s medications can be a daunting task, but with organization and ongoing communication, it can be more manageable. In-home care from Seniors Helping Seniors can be an invaluable extension to a family’s existing care. We help ensure that medicine management, meals, and general upkeep are always taken care of, providing peace of mind to families and helping seniors maintain their health and independence. At Seniors Helping Seniors, we’re not just caregivers—we’re companions who provide personal attention and genuine concern, making medication management less of a burden and more of a shared responsibility.