Holiday Travel Tips: Traveling with Elderly Loved Ones

By providing elderly assistance to your loved one, you can help make holiday travel simple and stress-free

Every holiday season, families in Gastonia, NC and all over the world travel to visit their loved ones and spend time with relatives they don’t get to see much during the rest of the year. As much as everybody is looking forward to this, traveling long distances can be tiresome, especially for older adults.

Common difficulties such as busy roads, traffic jams, spending long hours at the airport, shifting plans, and searching for accommodation can take their toll on senior travelers and their caregivers. For this reason, if you’ll be traveling with an elderly family member this holiday season, making sure they are well and comfortable during the trip should be your top priority.

The notion of traveling can seem especially scary to seniors in the early stages of dementia. Cognitive conditions such as Alzheimer’s disease and dementia often trigger emotions like frustration and anxiety when established routines are changed.

It can also get very frustrating for family caregivers who travel with their senior loved ones. To help you minimize the stress for your loved one, advanced home care professionals from Visiting Angels of Gastonia have compiled the following list of useful holiday travel tips.

Have a Plan

It is very important to create a travel plan before you get on the road with your elderly family member. Consider writing up a travel schedule and discuss it with your loved one a few days earlier. By sharing these plans with them, you can make them feel included, help them prepare better and minimize travel anxiety.

Organization is Everything

Make sure to organize and pack all the medications your loved one will need during the time they are away from home and store the medication in an easily accessible place. In addition to this, advanced home care professionals recommend you bring copies of important documents like medical records, prescription doses and schedules just in case. This way you will be more prepared to help your loved one in case of an emergency.

Ask for Help

When you book your tickets, ask about special accommodations and priority policies for senior customers. Most airline companies provide special rows for passengers with disabilities, which makes traveling so much easier for seniors in wheelchairs or those who use walkers and other walking aids. Advanced home care professionals suggest you also get in touch with hotels and restaurants where you’ll be staying and check whether they offer special options for older adults with mobility issues, dietary restrictions and other age-related problems.

Take Your Time

Make sure to take your time and plan every detail ahead of your trip. Rushed travel plans can boost your loved one’s discomfort and anxiety. Plan some extra time for travel delays and other unexpected holdups so neither you nor your loved one would get nervous or stressed while traveling.

Holiday traveling with an elderly loved one doesn’t have to be difficult if you follow these simple guidelines. The advanced home care professionals from Visiting Angels hope these tips can help both you and your senior loved one enjoy this holiday season to the fullest.

Visiting Angels of Gastonia, NC, is a leading provider of advanced home care solutions. To learn more about the in-home assisted living services provided by our staff of compassionate caregivers, please call our Gastonia office at (704) 825-3350 or contact us for more information.

Visiting Angels provides elderly assistance for seniors in Alexis, Belmont, Bessemer City, Boiling Springs, Casar, Charlotte, Cherryville, Cramerton, Crouse, Dallas, Earl, Fallston, Gastonia, High Shoals, Iron Station, Kings Mountain, Lattimore, Lawndale, Lincolnton, Lowell, McAdenville, Mooresboro, Polkville, Shelby, Stanley, Vale, Waco, and the surrounding areas of North Carolina.