Marion Shoard
A survival guide to later life
Constable Robinson
2004 PB, 644 pp, £9.99, 1 84 119372 0
The past is a foreign country, but so is old age, and as you enter it you feel you are treading unknown territory, leaving your own land behind. You've never been here before.1
This quotation sets the theme for this helpful and practical book. The author of A Survival Guide to Later Life deals sensitively with issues such as moving house, retirement housing and the selection of a care home. She includes, in the latter, a guide to the quality of tea bags and coffee used. Apparently, if both are cheap, then the presumption is that the management of the home may also scrimp on lighting, heating and ‘second helpings’.
The chapter ‘Adapting surroundings’ details changes that can be made to major rooms and gardens. There is also an excellent list of gadgets and aids, including stair lifts, alarms and walking aids, and clever ways of funding them. Bugbears such as incontinence are described, including suggestions of useful clothing and equipment like ‘kylie sheets.’
There is a detailed section on professional helpers, which states that:
‘The GP will decide, prescribe and control your access to the rest of the health service. Life or death, blindness or vision, inability of freedom of movement, and much more are theirs to determine!’
It also emphasises practical issues such as ‘flu jabs’, annual health checks and regular reviews of medication. Important issues such as age-related macular degeneration, dementia, depression, and employment of staff are also examined.
Other helpful chapters discuss money, state, housing and council tax benefits, and a further chapter considers legal and financial representation, which also covers vital issues including bank authorisation, power of attorney, receivership, and appointeeship. An appendix deals with complaints and lists useful contacts.
Each chapter is well referenced. Hoard concludes that many elderly people are happy in spite of some of the restrictions of old age. Moreover, she emphasises that it is only at this time of life that many break through the barriers that have prevented them from really knowing their younger relatives and descendants.
I recommend it.
- © British Journal of General Practice, 2004.
