Eldercare 101

August 1, 2016
Gerontologist and aging life-care manager Saavedra, with the help of other experts on the elderly, delivers on the promise in her subtitle. She divides her guide to caring for parents and other family members into six useful sections: Legal Ease, Money Matters, Living Environment Options, Social Considerations, Navigating the Medical Maze, and Spirituality and the End of Life. Making ample use of boldface type and shaded boxes, she defines such terms as power of attorney (a legal document that gives someone the authority to sign documents and conduct transactions on another person's behalf) and intestacy (dying without a will) in each chapter and also in a glossary at the end. Some of the advice seems obvious, some of it can be found on the web, and an index would have been a nice addition. But this just-the-facts service guide gathers a large amount of good information in one place and fills a serious need: the over-65 population will number 54 million by 2020 and 80 million by 2030. Saavedra's book will get a lot of use.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2016, American Library Association.)