Caregiving Calendar Options

[Ready2Dream]

My sister and I are struggling with juggling the caregiving schedule.  We both live an hour away from our mom and are looking for a way to share a calendar and a To Do List.  It seems like there should be an easy- to- use tool for this.  

I'm not looking to recruit volunteers, etc.  We just need to be able to look at the caregiver schedule and check in on our To Do List.

Any suggestions?  I haven't found anything on line that looks user friendly.

Thanks,

Cindy

[agoyer]

@Ready2Dream Hi! Juggling the calendar and to do list is such a challenge - I know as I've been caregiving for many years and juggled with my sister too.

I wrote a column about this!  "Apps to Help Caregivers Stay Organized" here on the AARP Family Caregiving website - check Carezone in the column - it sounds more like what you need. Lotsa Helping Hands focuses more on coordinating a lot of volunteers, and CaringBridge has an emphasis on providing updates to a wide number of people who are following the care journey -  but also has shared calendar and task options so you should definitely check it out and see what you think. Carezone is a bit more focused on managing various aspects of caregiving and includes a shared calendar and task list, as well as medication lists, automatic reminders,  and many other features but you can choose to use just the features you want to use.

I'm partial to apps and sites that I can use both on my computer and on my phone and tablet. There are many "to do list" apps - I use Wunderlist for a task list, and you can create lists that you then invite other people to, so they can also add tasks and also check off tasks. You can assign tasks to people as well. I use it for my personal, work and caregiving. For a calendar I primarily just use my ical on my Apple products and send my sister mtg invitations and vice versa. Then we both have the appointments in our personal devices that we also use for the rest of our life. I have color coded so that I can easily see which appts are for me, those I'm caring for, work etc. You say you're using google calendar and that's very similar too. 

I provide more tips in my column, "6 Tips for Choosing Family Caregiving Technology"!

I hope this is helpful! Let me know if you need more info - and I'd love to know what you end up using!

Amy Goyer, AARP Family & Caregiving Expert

Author, Juggling Life, Work and Caregiving and

Color Your Way Content When Caring for Loved Ones

[AmandaSingleton]

Hi Cindy:  Have you checked out Lotsa (www.lotsahelpinghands.com)?  Also using Google shared docs and calendars may be another user-friendly option.   Let us know what you decide on!

Best of luck,

Amanda

[Ready2Dream]

Yes, I spent a couple of hours on that sight.  Sorry to say it was not very user friendly and was really made for someone looking for numerous volunteers.  Maybe if someone had a catastrophic accident and needed multiple volunteers, it would be helpful.

We are looking for a Caregiver schedule and To Do List.  Right now we are trying Google Calendar/Drive (nice to share documents, etc).  My sis created an email account for our mom and then we can view that Calendar.  Just surprising that there isn't something already out there that works for scheduling care for their elderly parents and managing things from a distance.

Opportunity for someone that knows how to design and implement a program?  An App sure would be nice that works on iPhone and Android.  Is that too much to ask?!  Having to switch back and forth with user accounts is challenging.

Thanks for the reply.