For seniors, cleaning and maintaining the home can be difficult if mobility becomes restricted or illness takes hold. Everyday tasks that once seemed simple often become much more challenging in these circumstances.
Help with “light housekeeping” or more comprehensive housekeeping and personal care assistance is available for seniors in Calgary who want to remain living in their homes but are unable to adequately look after it or themselves.
But housekeeping—everything from keeping bathrooms clean to tidying the yard—tends to get lumped together as one. In reality, there are light, medium, and heavier housekeeping duties that should be distinguished from each other as they require different levels of service.
Let’s take a look at light housekeeping, what it entails, and what you can typically expect someone tasked with light housekeeping duties to do.
What is light housekeeping?
Light housekeeping is one of the services provided by senior in-home care agencies like All About Seniors. It is designed to help maintain a safe, comfortable, and healthy environment for seniors who:
- Are relatively healthy but are struggling with basic but essential housekeeping tasks due to mobility or other issues or
- Have suffered a period of illness or injury and need some temporary help around the home.
Most people think of vacuuming and laundry when they think of light housekeeping—but duties encompass a little more than that…
What are the essential light housekeeping duties?
Light housekeeping generally includes the following types of tasks:
- Tidying up clutter: this includes cleaning up items on the floor that could cause trips or slips or block safe access to another room.
- Cleaning the kitchen: dishes should be washed, dried, and put away, and all counters, cooking areas, and kitchen surfaces need to be germ-free for a safe environment—with regular disinfection.
- Vacuuming and mopping floors: sweeping, vacuuming, and mopping the floors once a week is also essential for a clean home.
- Dusting and wiping down open surfaces: dust can harbour bacteria or create breathing problems for seniors, so it should be removed from visible, open surfaces.
- Bathroom cleaning: general light cleaning and disinfecting of the bathroom(s) is essential for a healthy home, too.
- Changing the bed linen: another challenging task for seniors is making the bed and changing sheets, pillowcases, etc., and laundering them—tasks that can be looked after by an in-home caregiver.
- Laundering clothes: basic tasks like operating the washing machine and drier/hanging clothes to dry are simple for caregivers to do but not for many seniors.
- Disposing of the trash: trash bags can be awkward and heavy for seniors and are best left to a caregiver to handle as part of the light housekeeping duties.
- Watering the plants: watering the house plants can also be considered light housekeeping, helping to create a healthy home environment.
- Organizing closets and drawers: putting things away in their rightful place in closets and drawers is also light housekeeping,
Most caregivers want to create the best possible environment for their clients to reside in, meaning that many go beyond the basic duties. However, both clients and caregivers need to understand the boundaries of light housekeeping and what’s usually not covered. This can prevent misunderstandings when home visits begin…
What light housekeeping isn’t…
Ultimately, it should be remembered that caregivers tasked with light housekeeping duties are not cleaners. So, they cannot be expected to provide the same level of deep cleaning as professional cleaning companies.
Duties not associated with light housekeeping
The following duties are more intense but sometimes mistakenly expected to fall under the umbrella of “light housekeeping”:
- Deep cleaning: thorough, professional cleaning, like scrubbing the grout in the bathroom with specialist cleaning chemicals or cleaning ceiling fans, is not considered light housekeeping.
- Shampooing carpets: this goes beyond standard vacuuming and is part of a deeper clean that should be organized with a professional cleaning company or a family member qualified to do so.
- Scrubbing or steam cleaning floors: mopping is light housekeeping, but hard scrubbing of deeply engrained patches of dirt or steam cleaning requires extra cleaning effort.
- Cleaning windows: clean windows are not necessary for a safe home environment so this job is not light housekeeping—and should be left to professional window cleaners or someone else qualified to do it.
- Deep cleaning household appliances: Deep cleaning the fridge, stove, oven, or other appliances is not considered light housekeeping.
- Moving heavy items around the home: whether it’s a heavy piece of furniture or another sizable item, moving it is not light housekeeping.
- Polishing metallic surfaces: whether it’s chrome, brass, silver or another metallic surface that has become tarnished, polishing is a job classed as deep cleaning rather than light housekeeping.
- Yard maintenance: other than disposing of the trash, light housekeeping duties should be indoors and should not include tending the yard, mowing the lawn, raking leaves, watering the outdoor plants or cleaning the gutters.
- Shovelling snow: In Calgary, there are city bylaws that keep public areas immediately outside your home free of snow and ice, but it’s not part of the “light housekeeping” remit.
A caregiver providing light housekeeping will also be able to provide some degree of companionship for seniors who live at home, but this is not their primary task. More specialist companionship services are also available from trained caregivers at All About Seniors if required.
Similarly, running errands may be something that a caregiver tasked with light housekeeping may do out of kindness, but it should not be considered part of their standard role.
It is not uncommon, however, to find caregivers who go “above and beyond” their standard tasks to help out clients in need.
How can light housekeeping help seniors?
Light housekeeping helps seniors living at home on several levels:
- Looks after tasks that seniors are incapable of
- Allows seniors to continue living at home with some degree of independence
- Improves their quality of life
- Helps with observations about a senior’s health that can be reported back to the care team
- Improves the safety of seniors
- Protects their health
- Provides companionship
- Provides peace of mind for seniors and their families
Other key home-based tasks besides light housekeeping that professional caregivers can provide include meal preparation and personal care, such as bathing or dressing. They can also provide medication assistance.
All About Seniors provides a range of in-home care services for seniors in Calgary. As the longest-standing home care and companionship service in the city, our personalized care services ensure peace of mind and safety for seniors during times of need. Contact us for more information.