Keep doing what you’re doing, because it works. Those were the words Nancy Miller was told by her father’s neurologist at a recent check-up.

Nancy became her dad’s caregiver six years ago when heart surgery resulted in vascular dementia. Instead of transferring him to an assisted living facility, Nancy opted to keep him at home and update his life and surroundings to meet his new health care needs.

Nancy feels there are two components to her father’s current healthy status: her ability to keep him home in familiar surroundings, and his participation in Herndon Harbor Adult Day Health Care.

At the Center they are interacting with Dad all day and keeping him talking and alert. They curate his experiences around his interests and abilities. This is important because his primary care physician tells me that people with vascular dementia can improve if you exercise their brain. So, all of this is definitely having a positive impact on his brain health.

Since he is enrolled at the Center during the day, I am able to keep him living at home. The house has been updated to meet his health care needs. But we have dinner together at the same table he has always dined at — and that familiarity makes a big difference.

Orienting him in this way has helped Nancy’s dad. Supplemental care options like companion care are always there if I need them. But the consistency he has day-to-day through attending the Center and being home is making a positive difference.

Learn more about how Nancy’s Dad transitioned from the Senior Center to Adult Day Health Care.