This week's stress relief photo was taken on the grounds of Castle Howard in Yorkshire, England. The yellow fields of rapeseed put on a magnificent display each spring. Caregiverlist invites you to enjoy the photo and share it with loved ones. At Caregiverlist we know the realities of caregiver stress. Thank you caregivers and certified nursing aides for your hard work and caring for our seniors. Please refer your friends to apply for part-time and full-time job positions on Caregiverlist.com and visit our career center for additional career tools. Have a great week.

For seniors, one of the best ways to prevent the onset of dementia is to keep the mind active. This doesn't mean that seniors need to be constantly working on complex projects, though. Brain exercise as simple as reading a book, completing a crossword or playing a brain game will keep the cogs turning. The Logic Puzzles app provides caregivers and their senior clients a way to exercise their minds.

The premise of the games in this app is to read clues and figure out the breakdown of the scenario accordingly. For example, the first game in the app focuses on a bobsledding tournament. The clues at the bottom are designated to help users decide who in the puzzle belongs on the team from which country, which of them are partners and what color bobsled they compete in.

The grid above the clues shows all of the possible combinations and as seniors read the clues, they can mark the boxes below as red for not correct or green for the correct combination. For example, one of the clues says that Ted and his partner are the white sled, so the user would select a green box for Ted and the white sled. They could also select a red box for the white sled column under the other users, but they do still need to figure out who Ted's partner is.

Long-term care insurance policies require caregivers to be trained to meet the policy requirements. The caregiver training requirements will vary based on the policy but usually require a caregiver to have professional training meeting their state requirements or to be a Certified Nursing Assistant (C.N.A.) by passing the state C.N.A. training course and state exam.

Learn about caregiver training requirements in your state to purchase training meeting your LTCI policy.

Senior caregiver training requirements vary by state, based on state law requirements for licensed senior home care agencies and private duty senior care (caregivers hired and paid privately - this is still an old-school term used in the industry: "private duty").

Why do states regulate senior care? Because most senior care fraud starts in the home by a loved one or caregiver. Senior care can take an emotional toll on the caregiver and sometimes this can lead even good caregivers to take a wrong turn to justify financial, emotional or physical elder abuse.

In addition, many of our modern employment laws, such as payroll taxes which an employer takes out of each check for the employee and also contributes additional money for each payroll, provide for Social Security benefits, Worker's Compensation benefits and insurance protections and healthcare benefits.

States are passing legislation to protect both the caregiver and the senior. 

Caregiverlist provides a training portal to allow senior care companies to easily train all of their caregivers and track the training renewals while giving the caregivers a competency exam to test retention of the training skills.

Family caregivers and hire-direct caregivers can also take online caregiver training to learn basic caregiving skills to make sure they are maintaining safety and staying current with elder-abuse laws, privacy laws and the latest Alzhiemer's disease care and approved medications and other age-related disease care. Caregivers may view training required in their state and join the Professional Association of Caregivers to receive a t-shirt and lapel pin along with their online training course.

This is one of my favorite times of year, when the world is bursting with the colors of new life. Thank you caregivers and certified nursing aides for your hard work and caring for our seniors. Senior care training assists caregivers to better manage a senior's care needs and manage caregiver stress. This week's stress relief photo was taken in Lincoln Park in Chicago. Please enjoy and feel free to share the photo and inspirational quote with loved ones. We hope you have a great week.

With spring upon us and Earth Day this weekend, caregivers and their senior clients might be wondering what they can do to be environmentally friendly and get outdoors a little more. As a hobby, gardening offers a way to help the earth, grow your own healthy foods and relieve some stress. The Garden Compass app provides gardening assistance to caregivers and their senior clients.

Caregivers and their senior clients can spend some time discussing what they'd like to plant in their garden before purchasing seeds. Seeds can be purchased online or at a retailer such as Home Depot. Once caregivers and their senior clients have decided what they'd like to plant and selected a location for their garden, then they can begin using the app. 

Users need to create an account upon initially opening the app. This can be done using a Facebook profile or email address. Then, caregivers can begin building their garden virtually. The app allows users to quickly scan the barcode on a plant to accurately add it to their garden. Alternatively, caregivers can search by the exact scientific name of their plant to add it to the list, or they can add a more generic category to the garden list. The generic categories include Annuals, Bulbs, Citrus and Avocado, Vegetables and Herbs, etc.

Nursing home daily rates are usually above $100 per day and can be higher than $400 per day, as the Caregiverlist Nursing Home Costs directory shows. Many Illinois nursing homes charge more than $300 per day for a private room and the median cost for a single room is $208 per day. Studies show that nursing home workers are among the most underpaid working women and men in the country with 1 in 3 nursing assistants relying on public assistance for some of their family's living needs.

Chicago Illinois nursing home workers participated in rallies on Thursday, April 14, 2017, to showcase their need for a higher hourly pay rate, seeking $15 per hour. Politicians, including two high-profile Democratic candidates for governor, Chris Kennedy and J.B. Pritzker, joined the rallies.

The Paraprofessional Health Institute reports in their research that nursing assistants and workers providing laundry, food and housekeeping services are underpaid, often viewed "as a cost to be managed rather than an asset to invest." Keeping the wage floor low leads to 50% of nursing home workers leaving their positions each year and adds to the dramatically growing gap in available trained long-term care providers.

Nursing homes employ Certified Nursing Assistants (C.N.A.'s) who must meet minimum training requirements and pass a state certification exam to care for residents.

• 91% of Nursing Assistants are Women
• 1 in 3 C.N.A.'s rely on taxpayer-funded public benefits such as food stamps, energy assistance or Medicaid
• Insufficient staffing levels contribute to high injury rates and high turnover
• The average turnover for nursing assistants exceeded 50% in 2012
• More than 1.3 million older Americans and people with disabilities currently reside in nursing homes
• 10,000 Americans turn age 65 daily and the number of older Americans age 85+ will triple by 2050

Finally we get to enjoy the marvel of blossoms and the new life of spring. We invite you to take a moment to relax and enjoy our stress relief photo and inspirational quote and share them with loved ones. This week's photo of a blossoming tree was taken in Central Park, New York. Thank you caregivers and certified nursing aides for your hard work and the care you provide for our seniors. More caregivers are always needed as seniors in America are living longer. You can learn more about becoming a senior caregiver and apply for a job near you. We hope you have a great week.

Professional senior caregivers now may take formal training curated to meet state licensing requirements for senior care. As Americans are living longer, while needing care for some of those years and end-of-life care, both professional and family caregivers may join the Professional Association of Caregivers to keep up with industry news and research. The online caregiver training delivers skills for safety for both the senior and caregiver. Learn how to communicate with seniors, understand age-related illnesses, medications, infection control, environmental safety, transfer skills from bed to wheelchair to walker and more.

For seniors, keeping the mind active is vital to preventing the onset of dementia. And for their caregivers, finding a way to relieve stress is paramount to a healthy lifestyle. The Penny Dell Crosswords app provides free daily crossword puzzles to meet both of these needs.

When users first download the app and open it, they will be taken on a guided tour through the different areas in the app. These include the Daily Puzzle, the Puzzle Library and the Puzzle Store. Caregivers and their senior clients can complete the daily puzzle for free each day.

When users navigate to the Daily Puzzle section, they will see options for level of difficulty. Caregivers can choose between an Easy, Medium or Hard puzzle. Since the app allows users to complete all three levels of difficulty on any given day, there are actually three puzzles available for free each day. 

Once caregivers have selected a puzzle, the app will highlight each row one at a time and display the clue. Users simply need to use the keyboard on their phone to type in the answers. The app will then automatically bring up the clue and number of spaces for the next question. Caregivers can use the arrows on the sides to skip back and forth between clues.