My mother is 87, lives alone. She refused all rehab after hip replacement surgery. She handles her financial affairs very well. She has delusions of a former neighbor harassing her. Auditory hallucinations which she hears at all hours (loud country music, she says) "Can't you hear that?" She makes multiple calls to police. They come out, pretend they believe her, and say they'll take care of it. She was a home health nurse for many years, used to tell funny stories and laugh about the nutty old people. She has no desire to use a cell phone or a computer. She is profoundly hearing impaired, doesn't want hearing aids. I do her shopping, make and get her to appointments. Would it be useful for me to create a gmail account in her name, to get access to things like MyChart? Would it be a HIPAA violation for her providers to communicate with me via that email?
If so, I have a suggestion for you, go and rent a mail box like at a large parcel & shipping type of store. UPS has freestanding ones. But if there is a university or college in your town there will be one nearby campus as well. Whichever it is, you rent the box as you need to present an ID to do this and it becomes the new address for everything mom, and you make it a point to go by regularly and deal with her bills and finances.
So she see docs that use My Chart? We have that and if a health system is using it, you flat almost have to do stuff online to schedule and see test results, contact a provider, pay a bill, etc. So that alone is justification to do a Gmail address for her and get an my chart account going for her. Then when she has her next appointment, be sure to get her to do the HIPPA sign off for you. The staff at a practice with lots of elderly know how to get this done with…. ahem…. recalcitrant elders.
out of curiosity, how well can she do her ADLs? If she refused rehab after hip surgery, is she able to walk, transition from bed to stand, on & off toilet, in & out shower? How big of a fall risk is she?
Having hallucinations, placing multiple false reports to the police all those show she is not able to do “executive functioning”. How do you know that she for sure “handles her financials affairs very well”? One good part on getting her address changed is that you will be able to see in detail what she’s doing with credit cards, if her property insurance,
taxes are getting paid, what type of withdrawals she’s doing from her checking account. There could be things amiss that are subterranean.
Make everything as easy as you can for yourself.
momma. She’s 75, and was still using social media at the time but it was so easy to communicate with her drs that way.
Also, I and my brother both have access to her MyChart. I am her POA, but did not need to provide paperwork to sign into it.
Having access to these things is a godsend! She’s in the hospital right now because of a fall that compressed and cracked her L2 vertebrae. I’m having a hip replaced in 10 days. I’ll be able to keep track of her everyday progress.
As far as setting up contacts with her providers you can do that yourself you set up the account, you set up the password and you can send and get emails. The computer does not know you are not your mom.
It would be immensely helpful if you are listed as a person that can get and give info on her HIPAA forms. This would be particularly helpful when you are in the doctors office in person or if you ever have to take her to the hospital, or she is brought to the hospital.
The health care providers my mother used were on MyChart. I set it up using one of my own personal email addresses, but it was set up under my mother's information. I would sign in and look at her test results and then print them off for her to see, or any other information the doc sent her via MyChart. And I could ask questions as well. I also set up a gmail account with her name that I used for any other providers or whoever might need to send her stuff, and I would access it 1day to check it. If it was super important, I would call her and tell her. If it was, say, an email from someone, I would print it out and then give it to her when I would see her 1x week. Before I set up the 1x week visit, mother would find all kinds of reasons to make appointments with her health care providers...warranted or not.
Many times, seniors of have hearing issues also have hallucinations-auditory and visual - because the brain is trying to 'make sense' of what it can't and is filling in the 'blanks'. My mother had such, and would call 911 at all hours - with tales of someone lurking by the front door ready to break in, or someone living in the attic, or one time even, she had 5 of the CNN anchorpeople sitting in her in her living room talking to her at 1:30am!! Trying to convince her otherwise was impossible. You might want to have a conversation with her doctor about possible medications to help with this. At some point, the police might start charging for the visits to such a frequent caller since it is taking them away from more serious calls.