Okay, I have to admit it, I was a little nervous about how well this new session at our Fearless Caregiver Conference was going to work out. After 45 of our own conferences and keynoting over 100 other events, a pattern started to emerge with regards to the concerns that I was hearing from family caregivers. Most of the information presented to caregivers at events including ours, have to do with direct care issues: “How do I get dad to stop driving?” “What is a living will?” “What are the respite options in our community?” “How do I find the best long term care facilities?”. These are all perfectly reasonable and vital issues to cover in a conference dedicated to family caregivers. But I slowly realized that many other types of questions were being asked about more general issues such as “What will caregiving look like when my kids are caring for me?” “How will any of this be funded?”

These are all big picture issues, so who better to bring to an event than the big picture people: leading non-profit healthcare CEOs. Our luncheon panel of CEOs bravely opened themselves up to being questioned by a room full of over 400 family caregivers and created a memorable hour and a half for all involved. By all accounts it was truly a tremendous session. The CEOs heard about issues of importance directly from the caregivers and in return they spoke from the heart about their thoughts of what the future would look like for caregiving in the US. Many eyes were opened and none were dry by the end of lunch. To me, that room was filled to the brim with healthcare CEOs, from the well-known ones with multi-million dollar budgets to the hundreds of family CEOs making life and death decisions for their loved ones on a daily basis.

 
 

 

Gary Barg
Editor-in-Chief
gary@caregiver.com