having Important Information on hand takes the stress
out of caregiving

Imagine that you’re at work. You return from a meeting to find several messages from your mom’s caregiver. As you listen to them, you sigh with relief—your mom is fine, but the caregiver couldn’t find your mom’s health insurance card.

Having your loved one’s vital information in one place can help to simplify caregiving. Depending on your parent’s needs, you may wish to have a folder with medical and emergency information available to all caregivers, as well as a binder with financial and legal information accessible only to primary caregivers.

Keep the folder near a calendar with medical appointments. Although there are many ways you might organize it, one way is to have personal and health information in one pocket and medical insurance documents in the other.

Information to include in your vitals folder:

• Your parent’s name (as it appears on insurance information), address and phone number (for respite caregivers or aides who might not know), and date of birth
• List of doctors’ names and specialties, addresses and phone numbers
• Name, address and phone number of pharmacy
• List of medications with dosages; copies of prescriptions
• List of medical suppliers, including those who can overnight replacement supplies in an emergency, such as medsupplyco.com, everydaymedical.com, and www.medexsupply.com
• Emergency phone numbers
• An emergency plan of action
• Clear, legible photocopies of both sides of all medical insurance cards (consider enlarging the photocopies to make them easier to read)
• Name of health insurance company as well as phone numbers for customer service, billing and claims
• A few health insurance claims forms
• Your parent’s health history  

Storing medical records online

Websites can be an effective way to manage your loved one’s medical information. Numerous Personal Health Record (PHR) providers have sprung up in recent years to help patients consolidate health information, including Microsoft’s HealthVault (formerly GoogleHealth), Dossia, FollowMyHealth and MyPHR.

PHRs can contain a diverse range of data but usually include information about allergies and adverse drug reactions, chronic diseases, family history, illnesses and hospitalizations, imaging reports, immunization records, lab results, medications and dosing, surgeries and other procedures, etc.

Some PHRs allow for data to be shared with others, such as doctors. HealthVault is compatible with heart monitors and blood glucose devices, so your loved one can upload vital information that you or a physician can track. PHRs can also let you transfer medical records to and from doctors’ offices and hospitals, and order prescriptions safely and securely.

Separate financial and legal information

Financial information and legal documents should be kept as private as possible, yet still be convenient for caregivers who need access to:

• Your parent’s Social Security number
• Copies of wills, including a living will
• Durable health-care power-of-attorney form
• Copies of life insurance policies (including any policies through an employer)
• A list of bank accounts, annuities, IRAs, pensions, and other retirement information; include account numbers, the name of the investment firm, broker, and phone number