As you pour yourself into others, try to remember to keep your own “cup refilled” by devoting time to self-care. Here are self-care suggestions to may provide inspiration during these times:

1.) Give yourself permission to take time off for self-care; time to do whatever it is that your heart desires. Put it on your calendar, set reminders, and let others know that this is YOUR time to decompress however you see fit. There is NO reason to feel guilty designating self-care time; you need to be able to sustain the care you provide during this time.

2.) First and foremost, in the heat of what feels to be a battle, it is so important to know that THIS IS TEMPORARY. Hard to see in times of struggle, we know – but true, nonetheless. While we do not know when successful treatments will be found, a vaccination invented, when things return to “normal” (or what the new normal even looks like), on thing is for sure – we will not live in this current state forever. Breathe and hang tight.

3.) If you are comfortable with it, accept help from those who offer it to you. For many who aren’t on the front line, it’s a love offering in a time where they too, feel out of control. Let someone deliver your dinner, mow your yard or pick up your groceries for you. You are important in this time and deserving of attention and it gives you more time to take care of yourself.

4.) Try not to isolate yourself; while you may feel alone, there are most likely others experiencing similar emotions you can talk to. Find a person (even if it’s just a single person), to talk to, cry or laugh with. However, you need to unload the baggage that has accrued at work – make sure you find an outlet to help you unpack it and diffuse some of the heightened emotion these times manifest.

5.) Look for the joys in every day. That’s right, joys are still happening in the world; they just might be a little harder to see through the lens of COVID-19. Be still and present; reconnect with your environment, nature, and the people around you. You will find beauty. Even if you find a single joy per day, journal each and string them together to form a bridge of hope that will help you get to the other side of this pandemic.

We will get through this together – and the CreateAbility Team is here to help you in any way that we can. Please do not hesitate to reach out to us. We are here and waiting to support you!

Similar Reads:  4 Assistive Technology and Remote Monitoring Solutions for COVID-19 Transmission Reduction

The post Care Providers: 5 Ways to Keep A Healthy Mental Outlook During the Pandemic appeared first on CreateAbility Inc.

Being a caregiver is a high-demand role, period. While most develop their daily to-do lists, carefully checking off items as they accomplish them; caregivers of consumers with intellectual disabilities, TBI’s, and dementia typically experience a higher degree of variation from day-to-day in correlation to the mental state, physical health, and mood of the person they care for. These changes require patience and adaptability that can cause exhaustion and fatigue in busy caregivers. In fact, Family Caregiver Alliance studies have documented that approximately 70% of caregivers report sleep problems, 60% report sleeping less than 7 hours, and 10-20% use alcohol or sleep medication to go to sleep.

Consumer’s Perspective

While we empathize for the caregivers need for self-care, the population of adults with intellectual disabilities who experience sleep deprivation is even greater than that of the general population. (Doran et al., 2006) Additionally, consumers with intellectual disabilities and dementia thrive in an environment where routine guides their daily responsibilities and stabilizes expectations. For dementia patients, consistent lack of sleep can decrease cognitive functioning and retention (Alzheimer’s Association) and for adults with intellectual disabilities, it impairs their ability to control emotions, attention, and motor skills.

When Sleep Deprivation Collides

When the caregiver has an “off” day with the person receiving care, and the daily to-dos are still there on the list waiting to be accomplished, it is commonplace to handle responsibilities in the time that the caregiver allotted for self-care and sleeping. In turn, the schedule of the person receiving care is off kilter, causing anxiety that, in turn, affects their ability to sleep.

Upon examination of the symptoms of sleep deprivation or unscheduled sleep time from both perspectives, it becomes evidently apparent that without a sufficient place and time to replenish the body’s need for rest – so as to lessen the odds for an “off” day. Ultimately, the culprit of the question, “Who’s inability to sleep is affecting this situation?” resembles the same answer to the question, “Which came first: the chicken or the egg?” (It doesn’t really matter; it is important for the BOTH of you.)

Increasing the Odds for Sleep Success

Below you will find some ways we recommend for creating a systematic approach to improved sleep habits:

Creating good sleep habits – The Basics: 

• Designate a routine sleep schedule and stick to it each night.
• Make the hour before you go to sleep your quiet time. (No TV or technology to allow your brain time to decompress.)
• Create an inviting bedroom space with little clutter and comfortable bedding to induce better sleep.
• Invest in light blocking shades so that you can sleep well at any, given time of the day. 

Embrace physiological rules for better sleep: 

• Avoid caffeine in all forms for at least three hours before going to sleep.
• Limit exposure to backlit screens for about an hour before going to sleep.
• Eat your heavier meals earlier in the day.
• Spend a set amount of time exercising and/or getting outside each time. Do avoid exercise too close to bedtime to allow physical adrenaline to subside.

Most importantly, make sleep a PRIORITY; not an option or variable in each day’s schedule. Scheduling/tracking your sleep are important factors for the health of both the person receiving care AND the caregiver. The power to make it happen, however, lies with the caregiver or the organization the caregiver works for.

If you are a caregiver would like information on how CreateAbility’s MeMINDER app can affordably and efficiently help you make (and keep) sleep a priority for both the caregiver and the consumer, click here.

The post The Cyclical Effect of Sleep Deprivation on Caregivers and Consumers appeared first on CreateAbility Inc.

Fear not. Clients, loved ones and healthcare professionals that use our technology can have peace of mind that their information on our systems is safe.

You may have heard that there is a major flaw in the security of the World Wide Web — one that has even Internet security firms feeling a little panicked, according to a recent article “Heart Bleed Bug Could Compromise Large Part of the Internet”.

We want you to know that CreateAbility’s systems and the data in them are safe.  Since our technology babysits your loved ones, we take this very seriously.

Fatefully, the most popular open source cryptographic library and data transport layer implementation that is used specifically to encrypt traffic on the Internet has a bug in it.  This bug enables hackers to steal password information by causing systems to spew the “secure” information held in RAM – allowing attackers to steal the information.

CreateAbility’s systems keep all of the user account and password information is an encrypted database, and not in RAM.

You can read more about this in the link below, but essentially a massive vulnerability has been found in OpenSSL by a team of security engineers at Codenomicon and Neel Mehta of Google Security (he’s essentially a super Ninja warrior when it comes to protecting data).

In geek speak – OpenSSL is the open-source software package broadly used to encrypt Web communications. The flaw allows attackers to steal the information that is normally protected by SSL/TLS encryption, which is used to protect Web applications, e-mail communications, instant messaging (IM) and some virtual private networks (VPNs).

Essentially, that means a lot of Internet users are affected. And potentially, passwords, private communications and even credit card information could be available to hackers courtesy of this newly-discovered bug.

For more nformation about Heart Bleed, See:

http://beforeitsnews.com/business/2014/04/heart-bleed-bug-could-compromise-large-part-of-the-internet-2612796.html

The post Keeping Your Data Safe – Even in the Most Serious Attack on the Internet appeared first on CreateAbility Inc.