NORTH COUNTY : Shut-In Program Seeks Volunteers

A program to aid north Orange County shut-in senior citizens and their families is seeking volunteers to visit and make daily phone calls to the elderly.

The Orange County Caregiver Resource Center of St. Jude Medical Center in Fullerton is launching the program with a $39,000 grant from the AT&T; Family Care Development Fund.

A project director has just been hired, and the program is expected to begin by the end of the month, said Joyce Bryan, director of the resource center.

The program will include calling senior citizens five days a week and making weekly visits. It also will offer transportation to doctor visits and shopping, Bryan said.

“AT&T; found that employees that were the primary care givers to an elderly relative had a higher absenteeism rate and were under great stress,” Bryan said. “So they started looking for ways to relive the care giver a little.”

That’s where the new program comes in, offering a break to the primary care giver of an elderly relative while still meeting the needs of the senior citizen.

The program is open to anyone in the North County cities of Fullerton, Buena Park, La Habra, Brea, Placentia and Yorba Linda.

Designed to give senior citizens a sense of companionship, the program will assign one or two volunteers to the same senior citizen, Bryan said.

“Frail seniors, those who don’t drive any more and can’t do heavy housework but are still capable of living alone, can get easily depressed it they do not have any contact with other people,” she said.

Many frail elderly people don’t need skilled care to avoid entering a nursing home, but rather the care and concern of a friend and an occasional chore done around the house, Bryan said.

Changes in American society have led to a need for programs that supplement family visits.

“It used to be that we had more of an extended family situation, but the need for women, who were traditionally the care givers, to work outside the home and for young couples to move away from the family for jobs, has left a lot of seniors with no support net,” Bryan said.

She also noted that demands of work and the nuclear family have left many people little time to attend to elderly family members.

Even with those difficulties, family members are not quick to place senior citizens in nursing homes.

“Only about 5% of people over 65 are in nursing homes,” she said. “That’s a very small percentage of the amount of seniors out there.”

The new program will include volunteer handymen that will do small household repairs, such as fixing faucet leaks.

“It’s really geared toward keeping the seniors independent, healthy and safe,” Bryan said.

Volunteers for the new program will be trained in the next few weeks.

“We’ve been in Fullerton four years, and there are a lot of people at home here who really want to help and don’t know how to plug into something,” Bryan said. “There are thousands who are over retirement age but still have plenty of stamina to help others.”