Residents collaborate to create network of senior resources

What do you do after your elderly mother falls in the shower?

If your senior father needs additional care at home, do you contact home health or hospice?

Six local elder care specialists have recently formed a Facebook group to help answer those questions and more in a network designed to help seniors and their families find local resources.

Trenton Mooney, senior real estate specialist at VYBE Realty, and wife Taylor, an occupational therapy assistant who specializes in home modifications, created the Elder Care Connection of Hood County Facebook group in 2022.

Through the group, Trenton met Courtney Kern, owner and operator of the local branch of Concho Hearts Hospice, J.M. and Michele Simmonds, co-owners of Clear Path Home Care, and Rozina Pittman, elder care advisor with Clear Path Home Care.

“We found that there was no single source of information within Hood County to bring all of the different resources that a senior might need together,” J.M. said. “All of us with our parents and people we've known, we've seen the struggle that they had to know what to do within the healthcare system to get the help that they needed, so we want to be that resource for them."

“We just started networking and talking about where our hearts were at, as far as helping the elderly community,” Trenton said. “Not one of us could get into it by ourselves, and we shouldn't allow the elderly community to do it alone either.”

The Elder Care Connection of Hood County Facebook group is a resource for adults ages 55 and older to find local events, services, and information.

“One of the things that this group does is we bring resources to the forefront so that people can start looking and planning, and by the time they need our services, they already have a plan and they're not in panic mode or driven by fear,” Pittman said. “A big thing with us is the patient, along with their wants, needs, and their voice.”

The Facebook group offers senior assistance with home health, hospice, wills, financial power of attorney, reverse mortgages, insurance, real estate, and home modifications.

All six elder care professionals use their own talents and skills to get the right care for any senior who joins the Facebook group. Taylor can help individuals with home modifications, like installing ramps, grab bars, nightlights, and widening doorways, while Trenton can help seniors who want to sell their home and move.

“I'm not afraid to go in there and get my hands dirty if that's what it takes to get them moved out,” Trenton said. “We're a phone call away and we're there.”

“The good thing about this group is that somebody knows something, someone, some resource, or some education,” Kern said. “It's one text message to the group and it's one call to the person who is the expert in that field.”

J.M. said collaboration is the key to providing good home care — and that’s what the group strives to provide.

“If you're not a fit for us, we're going to find who is,” Michele said. “If we can normalize collaboration and not competition, we're going to be able to take care of this flood of seniors that’s coming over the next however many years.”

According to the American Association of Retired Persons, every day in the U.S., 10,000 people turn 65, and the number of older adults will more than double over the next several decades to top 88 million people and represent more than 20 percent of the population by 2050.

By 2030, everyone born in the baby boomer generation will be at least 65, according to census.gov.

In Hood County alone, the United States Census Bureau reports that 25 percent of residents are 65 or older.

Trenton saw this growing need in Hood County and has been proactive in assisting the elderly since he started his senior real estate business in the beginning of 2022.

“It's just gonna get bigger from here,” he said, on the growing Facebook group.

“And it needs to,” Pittman chimed in. “Even if every one of us took on every client that we could, there's still not enough people (like) us doing what we do to cover that need. We want to spread the awareness to others so that they start doing the same.”

“There's not enough nurses, there's not enough caregivers, there's not enough of anything,” Michele added.

J.M. said the operators of the Elder Care Connection Facebook group will try to put on some small events in February around town for people to come out, meet with them and ask any questions they may have.

“It's a sense of responsibility and accountability,” he said.

A website for Elder Care Connection is “in the works,” according to Michele, but Hood County residents are welcome to join or message the Facebook page with questions.

“There's nothing quite like being a part of something that is bigger than you, so I think that we each have that heart,” she said. “To be able to surround yourself with people who are like-minded and have the same passions that you do for the elderly is pretty phenomenal.”

The six individuals work tirelessly to provide a network for seniors, voluntarily putting their own time — and sometimes money — into their new project.

“We're not doing this for personal gain, or accolades or our businesses,” Kern said. “It's truly just that we know there's needs to be met, we know a portion of those needs, and we know that by collaborating with these people, the whole patient is gonna get taken care of.”

“My whole life, I never felt like I was living on purpose, and now I do through this,” Trenton added. “This would not be possible without everybody involved. None of us could just take the credit. It was all of us that came together to put this group together, and now we’re learning from each other.”

For more information, message the Elder Care Connection of Hood County Facebook page or call/text Trenton Mooney at 254-216-3884.