Monday, February 24, 2014

Home Modification For Seniors

By Rey Vetangelo


It is very likely that you have been exposed to various individuals of varying levels of deafness throughout your life. These individuals, in addition to the culture of their homes are able to participate in their own culture that has a separate language, and customs that are amazing and unique from all other cultures in the world.

In the hearing world, the world of deafness is often understood as a world of disability, but this is often not how it is perceived by members of the deaf community. Rather than seeing deafness as a disability, they understand it as a different way of perceiving the world, and this is extremely important to the maintenance of self worth.

When you are speaking to someone that is struggling with hearing loss, you want to make sure that you are as clear as you can be. This means that you will want to talk to them face to face to ensure they are able to use your body language and your lips to interpret what you are saying.

As decreased mobility is often one of the major limitations that the elderly suffer from, alterations to the home that help improve the owner's mobility can begin to be considered early on. Such modifications as stair climbers that transport people up and down stairs or increasing the width of doorways in the home to allow for wheelchairs or motorized scooters to pass through are two modifications that can instantly help with mobility.

As you talk, you should be sure that your mouth is not obstructed and that you are annunciating as well as you can. This way, you can make the process of hearing and interpreting what you are saying much easier for someone that cannot depend solely on his or her ears to hear.

But with in-home modifications to the bathroom area, this room no longer needs to be problematic. Such modifications as walk in baths, lowered counter tops, installed hand rails, and even the addition of benches or seats can all make the bathroom a more comfortable place for seniors to navigate.

But not all modifications have to change the interior of the home. Some services and devices, such as a captioned call service which allows the hard of hearing to communicate via the telephone, are available that can simply make life easier for the elderly couple or individual living within their own home.

Third, you should be familiar with how a captioned telephone works. Your client may be using a captioned telephone and you want to make sure that you are speaking in a manner that allows this service to translate what you are saying for your client.

Trying to avoid speaking on the phone may be your best option. Talking face to face as often as possible is a great way to ensure that nothing is going to be lost in translation and that everything that you need to convey is going to be heard and understood properly. Working with clients that have hearing loss may require a little extra effort on your part, but it is important that you do what you can to make sure your client understands. With a little extra patience and time, you can tap into a target market that you may not have been able to communicate with before.




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