Helpful Summer Travel and Safety Tips for Seniors to Enjoy The Outdoors
Seniors and the family members caring for them have an excellent chance to travel as the summer temperature has become slightly pleasant. It’s important to remember that elders may be more vulnerable to health and safety risks when travelling in extremely hot weather. Every year, numerous senior citizens are admitted to hospitals for health issues brought on by extreme heat and humidity, like dehydration or nosebleeds.
Family caregivers and their seniors should be proactively prepared to manage the heat and its many disadvantages, especially when travelling to even warmer places. You can preserve your elderly loved one’s health and help them enjoy the summertime, with just a few easy steps and access to emergency apps like Emoha.
Here are 6 Crucial Safety Recommendations for Summer Travel:
1. Maintain hydration
Due to various circumstances, seniors are especially vulnerable to hypokalaemia and exhaustion. Summer days that are hot and dry make things worse. Caregivers must often check their elderly family members to ensure they are routinely consuming water. Always carry water bottles while travelling to make it simple for the elderly to stay hydrated. Foods with high moisture content, such as cucumber, pears, strawberries, vegetables, and soups, can be a good addition to travel snacking.
2. Use sunscreen, beanies, and other sun-blocking measures
It might be challenging to pass up the opportunity to go outside and tan in the sunlight during hot, sunlit hours. Constantly ensure your elderly beloved one is shielded from the sun when outdoors. Always keep high SPF and broad-spectrum sunblock on hand, and assist your loved one in reapplying sunscreen at regular intervals. Encourage your elders to wear a shaded sun hat and stretchy, warm clothing as additional ways to assist them in protecting themselves from the scorching heat.
3. Have a ready-to-use contact list
Would your senior be able to contact anyone in an emergency? Before going on a trip, ensure your beloved one is aware of the neighbourhood caregiver community. It helps to reduce the risks associated with a scorching summertime day and makes it easier for caregivers to visit the elderly whenever you can’t. As a primary caregiver, you can get the elders in touch with old friends, relatives, or neighbours who reside close by, a person who can often check in on your seniors to ensure their well-being. At the same time, be sure to have a list of emergency numbers prepared and placed somewhere your elderly loved one can readily find it. In this way, individuals may quickly access the names and phone numbers of neighbours, physicians, emergency services, licensed caretakers, and other valuable organisations.
4. Protect your eyes
Severe and slight vision loss is common among elderly persons. Summertime’s strong, intense sunshine and UV radiation can further worsen seniors’ vision, possibly resulting in issues ranging from pain and irritation to long-term vision loss. To protect their vision and aid in vision preservation, ensure your elder wears a pair of durable, protected eyeglasses while wandering.
5. Bring insect repellents and bug spray
During summertime travel, flying insects like mosquitoes may be a significant annoyance. In addition to being an outside inconvenience, mosquitoes may spread several illnesses, such as meningitis and the Chikungunya virus, which are can be fatal to older persons. Make sure to assist your elders in applying enough insect repellant so they can tour conveniently, and pack an extra supply so they may reapply it during the day to prevent them from getting itchy, contagious bug bites. Additionally, you can consider having insect-repelling outdoor accessories like torches, traps, or volatile oil reflectors that can help protect your beloved ones’ personal property from insects that can spread infection.
6. Exercise caution when using medication
Spend time discussing drug safety when the summer heat sets in. For this discussion, you can involve a medical professional, including your senior’s primary general practitioner. Some drugs may well have a secondary effect of sun hypersensitivity, whereas others have adverse effects like exhaustion or muscular cramping, which will be made worse by the heat. Other times, high moisture and temperature might spoil some medicines or lose their potency. Get a grasp on your elderly loved one’s meds as soon as possible to prevent any unintended incidents.
Conclusion
You may enjoy the summertime travel more if you are well-prepared. While nothing can be planned for, adopting some simple preparations will spare you a lot of troubles and worries if something goes wrong or you become sick while on holiday.
Planning an enjoyable and secure journey is simple with proper planning and supplies. Of course, each person is unique; therefore, you can have specific medical requirements that you must consider while on tour. When arranging your next vacation, be careful to discuss any health problems with your physician.
If you’re looking for end-to-end security when your beloved senior is travelling, the Emoha app can be of assistance. With this app, you get access to 24/7 emergency support, for non-medical & medical emergencies alike, that can be availed from any place in India, within seconds. Additionally, you also get exclusive benefits like travel booking assistance, special discounts on travel & medicines, a 24/7 daily convenience desk and much more. Download the app from Google Playstore or IOS App Store.
FAQ
Why should seniors travel?
Travelling overseas can help a person become more emotionally healthy and open-minded. Seniors are kept active and on the move through travel, frequently offering more exercise opportunities than living at home. As older travellers face their anxieties and step outside their comfort bubble, the trip may boost morale.
What does travel have to offer?
Travel will give us a deeper understanding of ourselves and the world. Thanks to it, we are now more understanding, sympathetic, and unafraid of diversity. We’ve learned a ton about life through travelling that we would never have in a book or lesson.
What impact does travel have on your life?
Whenever you travel, you face new cultures and people, learn new things, have great experiences (both good and terrible), and perhaps even rediscover the purpose of your existence. Travel may also help you become a stronger, more well-rounded person since you discover new things and absorb knowledge from different people and locations.
Why is it that travel makes you happy?
Neuroscientists claim that when people move, their brains are rewired. This is so since developing new neuronal connections in the brain requires fresh experiences. Your brain may be rewired to increase creativity and openness to new ideas, and travel makes you joyful because of this.
