Comfort Keepers Davie
Comfort Keeper’s in Davie, Florida is a family-owned and operated franchise serving families and their loved-ones since 2017. The family’s first location opened in 2017, after experiencing, first-hand the need for in-home services for their loved one. This defining moment sparked their desire to provide the same peace of mind and services to families who are overwhelmed and in need of care for their loved ones.
We launched the podcast with the aim of educating the public about various aspects of in-home care. Our objective is to offer a valuable resource that empowers individuals to make well-informed decisions regarding the well-being of their loved ones.
For more information visit:
https://www.comfortkeepers.com/offices/florida/davie/
or call: 954-947-7954
Comfort Keepers Davie
EP #19: Who Helps When Family Can't? Rethinking Care at Every Life Stage
Breaking free from conventional notions of home care, this illuminating conversation with Kristi Gurule of Comfort Keepers challenges the perception that caregiving services are exclusively for seniors. The reality? Anyone over 18 in Florida can benefit from professional care during life's challenging moments.
Kristi shares compelling examples of how Comfort Keepers provides crucial support beyond the elderly demographic. From a woman in her 40s navigating recovery after emergency retinal detachment surgery to patients managing post-operative care following same-day procedures like hip replacements, the need for professional assistance extends across all age groups. With hospitals increasingly discharging patients quickly, many face the challenge of "hospitaling at home" without adequate support systems in place.
The discussion explores fascinating niches like the booming South Florida plastic surgery market, where patients—particularly those traveling from out of state—require discreet, professional assistance during recovery periods. New mothers, military veterans dealing with PTSD, and the overwhelmed "sandwich generation" balancing childcare and parent care simultaneously all benefit from these flexible services. As Kristi eloquently puts it, "you can't pour from an empty cup," highlighting the importance of respite care for caregivers themselves. By breaking the taboo around asking for help, Comfort Keepers functions not just as caregivers but as "happiness consultants" and the "Sunshine Squad," elevating the human spirit regardless of age or circumstance. Have you considered how professional caregiving might fill gaps in your support system during life's unexpected challenges?
Please visit our website for more information: https://www.comfortkeepers.com/offices/florida/davie/
Welcome to the Comfort Keepers Davy podcast, where we elevate the human spirit. Here's your host, christy Groulet. Well, hello, hello, hello everyone, and welcome back to another episode of the Comfort Keepers Davy podcast. Christy, always a pleasure to see you. I say that every time we get together.
Speaker 2:It's always a pleasure, groulet. Yes, it's a pleasure. It's fun getting to be with you on this platform.
Speaker 1:Yes, indeed indeed, and we've talked a lot about issues pertaining to the elderly and I've kind of gotten it in my own mind, as I think many people do, that the type of services that you provide at Comfort Keepers are really specifically for seniors, but that's not necessarily the case. I know you were mentioning you're getting a lot more calls for other types of cases, so what other types of people can Comfort Keepers serve?
Speaker 2:Gosh, everybody truly so. For the state of Florida, as long as you're over the age of 18, my license allows me to come and provide you help. So this is a really great topic to open up, because anybody who thinks of home care in general, the general consensus is that, yes, it is for our aged communities, and that is definitely true. However, I want to tell you about a recent case that we just assisted with and an individual in her 40s living in Florida.
Speaker 2:She doesn't have any nearby family had an eye emergency, so she had a retinal detachment and I don't know. I would hope that you haven't experienced this, but essentially, it doesn't.
Speaker 1:It doesn't sound like a good situation.
Speaker 2:No, but you're generally supposed to remain attached.
Speaker 2:That is the goal, yes, and so when it becomes detached, it becomes an urgent matter and it needs to be taken care of quite quickly. And this individual couldn't drive herself to have the surgery. She's lost vision and an eye and she needs to be able to have multiple follow-up appointments, get back home safely, all of those things, and so, instead of trying to work her way through Uber, which again just a transportation service, we were brought in to the picture and what we were able to do is not just get her to and from her appointments, but we were able to go to the pharmacy, pick up her post-surgical medications, bring them home, help her get situated Once she got home, make her something to eat. She just had a very traumatic experience and she's now in a very, very rigorous recovery protocol. So all of those things we can help with, and it's been a very successful opportunity to show that this is just one of many examples of how we can additionally help.
Speaker 2:We have recently received a lot more for same day surgery centers. We're seeing shoulder replacements, hip replacements, and there's no longer an extended stay in hospitals because hospitals are so full and people are needing to come home and, essentially, hospital at home and recover. And that's another thing that we can come in and we absolutely can get them to and from to rehab afterwards, which is another really big deal. You don't just have a huge surgery and not go to physical therapy afterwards, so we can be there from the beginning short term, until you're able to be you again.
Speaker 1:So you got the wheels turning in my head. This is again something that I had never considered, because I thankfully I'm fortunate enough to have my wife with me. If she's not around, my father, I have family and people close to me that can help me when I have a procedure, whatever it is, so it wouldn't really be on my radar. But there are so many people out there that just don't have family close to them. Maybe, unfortunately, they don't have friends that are able to help them. To have that option available is really huge. But what if there's somebody that is in that circumstance and also like, from a financial standpoint, they're not in a good place? Are there any programs available or assistance state offered assistance, government offered assistance that can help people like that? Because it seems like almost a necessity. If you don't have somebody to help you and you can't pay for somebody to help, like how do you do it on your own?
Speaker 2:Right. So there may be some private insurances that would allow for there to be post billing, sending in for reimbursement. I have seen a few circumstances, things like that People who have long-term insurance plans. There is usually a policy that covers home care and this would fall under home care In an emergency situation. Going through all the hoops and hurdles and trying to find something that the state is going to cover, I just being realistic that's a further far shot to get that taken care of. Unless you already have services pre-approved. There are state Medicaid programs that you can again look into.
Speaker 2:But the example I just provided was more of an urgent matter and short term Right. So I think that's another really big thing is that Comfort Keepers doesn't force any of our workers clients to receive care outside of really what they need. If you need just a few hours, then by gosh, that's what we're going to do. We're not going to require you to have one of my professional caregivers in your home for eight hours a day, seven days a week, and there are agencies that do require that. We are not one of them.
Speaker 1:So what do you say to someone out there that doesn't have the family close by, doesn't have friends, but they're in a perfectly fine financial situation, they have access to the resources to pay for this stuff, but they have that mentality that we talked about before, that some of the senior clients have, that they don't want to get help, they want to go at it alone. It's like somebody is getting a procedure or whatever and they do want to take care of themselves. What would you say to somebody like that to kind of let their guard down and open up the possibility of bringing some outside help in?
Speaker 2:Honestly, I think that they should really look at whatever their circumstance is, and if them helping themselves is going to push them like 10 steps back versus 10 steps forward, are they doing more damage than good? So one of the examples that I'll tell you is there's a big market in South Florida for a lot of plastic surgery, and after plastic surgery, people don't just walk out of an operating room in the image that they hope to be in. There's quite a recovery period and there is a lot of assistance that is required, and it's something that is not talked about often enough. But there are a lot of surgery centers that do partner with home care agents like ourselves.
Speaker 1:I was just going to ask you that, as you were talking about like you should go, because this is like a perfect type of potential client for your business, Obviously if they're getting elective plastic surgery they can afford higher help to come, and why wouldn't you want that help? And why would you want to necessarily impose that burden upon your friends? If you don't have immediate family living with you, why do you want to go bother your friends to take care of you?
Speaker 2:And a lot of times, a lot of times, jeremy, these procedures, because they're elective, they're also very private, so there's not a you know, public notice to the whole family that I'm going to go and have this procedure done.
Speaker 2:It can remain private, but truly surgeons, doctors are absolutely recommending for there to be like help at home. So if you are going to leave a surgery center and stay somewhere temporarily because people fly into Florida all the time to have these procedures done and now they have like one to two weeks of recovery time and they didn't bring somebody with them from wherever it is that they're traveling from, this is a very real, everyday scenario in South Florida. So you find a hotel that you're going to be staying in for a couple of weeks or a short-term rental and who is helping you when you are there? Who is getting you to and from your post-op appointments? Who is helping you clean yourself because you are so sore and you can't do it yourself. That's exactly the kind of things that we can come in and help with professionally, privately, short term, and on you go.
Speaker 1:What you were just saying reminded me I was. I was playing golf with my brother, who's a lot younger than me but he's balding significantly and I also I'm missing a bunch of hair on the top, and we were talking about that while we were playing golf, and he was talking about this this crazy you can go to. You can go to Turkey to get your hair done and they pay for everything short of the plane flight, like the hotel, the transportation. They really hold your hand through the whole process. I don't know. Something you were saying just kind of reminded me of that.
Speaker 2:Like a concierge kind of thing.
Speaker 1:A concierge type service. Yeah, and I just think I got that parallel in my mind about the type of service that you offer here. If somebody is going to get elective surgery right, like you got to ride somebody to take you there, or somebody to take you home, somebody to cook, cook for you, take care of you the same type of things that you provide for most of your clients.
Speaker 2:Yes, For somebody in that situation into the thought process on this too. So you're a brand new mom who has three children at home and you're bringing home your fourth little one. Your husband is concerned about you at the hospital because you just had the baby Nursing staff. There's shortages everywhere, right? So again we were able to come in and help this woman in and out of bed throughout the evening so that she didn't have to rely on a call button from the rest of the hospital staff. It helped alleviate some of that additional stress on the labor and delivery floor and she was able to recover in the hospital and then go home, where we proceeded to follow her for the following week.
Speaker 2:Just because a brand new mother having children, already everybody needs an extra set of hands, and that's what we were able to provide. So again it's thinking outside of the box of what else does somebody need assistance with? And if it falls within our wheelhouse which a lot of it does as long as it doesn't require nursing services, we can absolutely step in and help short term, and that's fine. We really enjoy it.
Speaker 1:Yes, so how often is this coming up? I know you said this is this is something that is. You've always done this type of stuff, but it's coming up more and more frequently now, like what percentage of clients? Is this a very small percentage or is it? Is it really starting to come up more frequently now?
Speaker 2:So it's a smaller percentage right now, but conversations are starting to happen more and more in this industry and I think that's what's really important, because before there's ever a really big change or a push for anything, there has to be education about what it is that we can do. If you look at, oftentimes, a lot of home care branding, you're going to see a picture of an elderly couple, an elderly individual, and then nothing about that imagery makes you think, oh I, that these are things that we do. Don't just refer us to our 65 and older communities. We can help in all these other situations. And then word of mouth from those that we have helped Again kind of breaking that taboo. There's taboo for coming into a home when you are a senior citizen. There's taboo coming into the home when you're not a senior citizen but you need assistance. So if we can just break the taboo and all the stigmas around asking for help, that'll solve a lot of problems.
Speaker 1:No taboos around here. You want to come in and help me with the laundry cooking? My door is always open.
Speaker 2:That's exactly it. Temporarily, we can help you with it too.
Speaker 1:Yes, yes, what else we got? Where are we going from here? Oh my God, hit me, I've run out of questions here.
Speaker 2:Sky's the limit. Yeah, I think that another thing that is taboo and something that needs to be talked about more is our military members coming home. Our military members who've already been home, who are not necessarily struggling with personal care per se, but more. Yes, exactly.
Speaker 2:PTSD personal care per se but more yes, exactly, and yeah and can't say. I cannot say that we are mental health experts, but what I can say is that us coming in and being a companion, somebody that can help just alleviate your mental stress, by being a another voice in your life, um offering up opinions that are um purely for the good of whoever we're helping and offering suggestions to get them out of the home, to bring joy, elevate their human spirit.
Speaker 1:You are not you are not a mental health, a licensed mental health professional, but you are in fact a happiness consultant.
Speaker 2:Seriously, mic drop. Yes, it's so true. The Sunshine Squad.
Speaker 1:The Sunshine Squad. Happiness consultants Love it, that's right?
Speaker 2:Yes, because that's ultimately what everybody that we work with to be is happy and truly. We just see it so much, and we don't just see it in our military. It's just a population that we definitely know it exists. But, man, we have a lot of our sandwich generation. Let's talk about that, jeremy.
Speaker 1:Ooh sandwiches, what I'm hungry you got a sandwich for me.
Speaker 2:So the generation that's raising children at home and they're also in their career and they're also helping take care of their parents.
Speaker 1:No, no, no, Back back up a second. Okay, I have a hard enough time taking care of myself, let alone my children too. If I had my parents living here as well and they were like immobile and I had to also wait on them and cater to them, I would just go. I would go bananas. I really would. I'd lose it.
Speaker 2:It's a real thing, Jeremy, and we have so many of our current clients from this generation because they need help. So at least this generation is hopefully they're reaching out and getting that help because we love helping them. But along with the mental health that's a lot of toll on somebody to balance Making sure that their, their families at home, are totally cared for, but also the obligation to their parents who have raised them, their obligation there, who have raised them their obligation there. You can just see this strain that's taking its toll physically, mentally, emotionally, spiritually, in every single way. So even being able to come in and offer respite, offer just a day or two a month to allow that individual to go and be with themselves, to take care of themselves Cause you can't pour from an empty cup, you can't, it's impossible.
Speaker 1:A hundred percent. I always say that when I'm going through it, like it is nearly impossible to extend the care necessary when you're you yourself are not well, when you're not doing well mentally or physically. It's just so taxing and it's virtually impossible to help others. So you always gotta get your own situation in order before you can help others.
Speaker 1:Or sometimes that's not always true. I shouldn't say that. Sometimes, when you're not doing well, helping others actually takes your mind off the fact that you're not doing well and it changes your mindset. But it's not always the case. But it's very, very difficult when you're not on par.
Speaker 2:Right, and acknowledging that everybody does need help at some point in time. Everybody does, and you just have to speak up and we're there to help.
Speaker 1:What else we got, Christy? Anything else on the sandwich generation?
Speaker 2:Honestly, they're some of the hardest working people that you'll ever meet. Truly, talk about somebody that can multitask and just run a household. Those are the people that you can't wait to relieve. You can't wait to help them. It's rewarding, it's when it's helping the whole family unit and not just the client.
Speaker 1:Very, very good. Okay, well, unless you have anything else to add, let's leave it at that. I think we covered some good stuff here. That's a wrap.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Thank you everyone. Thank you everyone for tuning in. Say hello to Charlie here. He's been hanging out with me, charlie. He wants to wish you all a wonderful day.
Speaker 2:Yes, hello, goodbye, charlie.
Speaker 1:All right, everyone, as always, if you found this content useful, don't forget to like, subscribe all that fun stuff. Leave us some comments. Let us know if you've ever had your own experience dealing with this. I don't know, maybe you already use this type of service, maybe you had elective surgery and, who knows, maybe you hired comfort keepers and they helped you and they did a great job. Let us know about it in the comments. We are always interested to hear what you have to say. Thank you, everyone for tuning in and we will catch you all next time on the next episode of the Comfort Keepers Daily Podcast. Bye-bye, bye, bye. Thank you for listening to the Comfort Keepers Daily Podcast. For more information, visit comfortkeeperscom or call 954-947-7954.