When the Telephone Becomes a Problem for the Elder in Your care in Troy, MO

Years ago my eighteen month old son went into my bedroom, picked up the phone and started punching keys. I noticed he was missing and when I called him he came toddling out of the bedroom. It never occured to me to go in and check the room. The next thing I knew there was a policeman at my door telling me someone had called 911. The phone was still off the hook and there was a 911 operator on the other end.

This may have been cute when they are a year and half old but what do we do when they're 87 with Alzheimer's and your still getting emergency personnel showing up at the door?

I took care of several seniors who had problems with this. The solution for one family was to put the phone on the top of the refrigerator so mom couldn't get to it. Another, an elderly man, would have trouble dialing his daughters number, when the 911 operator would answer, he thought it was his daughter and would start telling her all his woes. You, of course, know what happened next, I'd be at the door explaining to the officer that there was no emergency.

The man who wrote the following article also had some problems with his dad and telephones and came up with some solutions also.

Telephones and Alzheimer's