ShirleyBOARD’s online network for caregivers
can make the whole process a little easier

BY LEE KAPLAN —
If you’re a caregiver for a family member, you know all the challenges — emotional, logistical, financial. You often struggle to balance the demands of your life with the necessity of managing their care.

And keeping everyone in the informational loop — family members, medical professionals, home care providers — can be a nightmare. It is even more problematic if you live miles away from your loved one and are trying to keep up to date on their care. You either have to deal with care providers from a distance or you have to uproot the person your caring for from a support group of friends so you can coordinate care locally.

Mark Willaman went through those challenges while caring for his mother who had Alzheimer’s Disease. That experience inspired him to create a Web site that would help others caring for aging loved ones. Willaman describes ShirleyBOARD, named after his mother, as an online caregivers network bulletin board, where people post and share information. It's available free of charge, with support encouraged in the form of donations.

It lets the caregiver, as the administrator of the site, provide and exchange information about the ongoing care of the elderly family member to those who need it.

So, for example, care managers, doctors, nurses and home care providers might have access to information about the patient's medications and care plan. They can also share contact information to facilitate communication among care providers. Attorneys and hospitals can be given access to legal documents, like Power of Attorney and living wills. And, friends and family members could share access to information on the patient's care planning calendar and care journal (an online diary). They can also send messages to the patient and caregiver.

This would have been a great help to my brother and me if it had been around several years ago, when we moved my mother out to Minnesota from Massachusetts so we could supervise her care. That meant we had to take her away from her very tight circle of loving and supportive friends. I tried to keep them involved though weekly mailings, but if there had been a ShirleyBOARD at the time, it would have made the process more timely and more rewarding, both for them and for Mom.

Set up and use is very simple. In a matter of minutes, the user can set up an administrative account and start inviting other parties to share in the information. As a user, you also get access to the site's network of peers. So you can search for fellow caregivers nearby to help find assistance in locating available services or just to connect with other care givers who are going through the same thing to ask questions and share ideas.

ShirleyBOARD can also be a valuable tool for care managers and home care providers. They can manage multiple clients from the same Web site. It can facilitate management of patients with out-of-town care givers by improving the level of communication and saving time on the phone.

(Posted April 27, 2009)