Trained Care Advisors

Passports provide one prepaid first step consultation with a highly trained and empathetic Care Advisor from the nation’s leading care advisory firm.

This telephone-based consultation typically lasts 12 to 20 minutes (as long as it takes to address the issue the caregiver raised). Indeed, because the Care Advisor deals with the caregiver’s most immediate and pressing issue, the consultation provides enormous help to the Passport Holder. The value of this call is at least $25.00, and probably much more based on typical hourly fees charged by care advisors.

Caregiving members with access to the (1) Passport, (2) Care Advisor consultation and (3) private Internet "family room" can reduce both the time and expense of caring for a loved one. To facilitate continuing support, Passport Holders completing the initial Care Advisor consultation are told in an appropriate way that, when needed, they can purchase additional consultation time easily by charging it to their credit card.

What Care Advisors Discuss

It is hard to appreciate the true value of the Care Advisor consultation without insight into the types of caregiving issues that the telephone-based advisors discuss. Typical discussions include:

• How to hire and manage in-home help.
• Modifying a home for optimal caregiving efficiency and safety.
• Knowing when it is time to get help or think about facility placement.
• Time management and problem-solving assistance in many areas, including:
• Breaking down a confusing, even overwhelming, problem into “actionable steps” that can be prioritized and completed in ways that empower the caregiver;
• Conflict management (often with siblings) and how to cope with caregiver stress and burn-out;
• How to recognize changing roles and relationships within the family, and how to ask for help from other family members.
• How to evaluate a care facility beyond the obvious.
• Insight into the process (and typical progression) of various conditions, such as Alzheimer's.
• What typical costs are, and how different aspects of care are paid for;

• Awareness and understanding of the various types of community-based services.
  How to find resources in any urban area of the nation, and what's available in rural areas.
• Long-distance caregiving, and how to handle emergencies from a distance.
• End-of-life planning.