IT Help!

[KMorr]

Hi there!
My Dad has recently been diagnosed with early stages of Alzheimers and the main difficulty he is having is IT problems. He was the one who tended to deal with all admin tasks so I was looking to get support to get the best systems in place to help him and my mum and that we could help from further away. The main issue we have is with passwords and emails! I have looked into Abilitynet, but wondered if anyone has had experience with them or has any other suggestions? Many thanks.

 

[Izzy]

Welcome to the forum.

I’m sorry to read about your dad’s diagnosis. It must be hard for you to come to terms with the changes in your lIves.

I’ve not experience of Ability.net but wondered if this information would be of any help -

How technology can help

If you're living with dementia, find out about technology that can help with different aspects of daily life.

www.alzheimers.org.uk

 

[nitram]

For general info.
Ability.net is a charity supporting old and disabled people in using computers.
One of their activities is offering IT support provided by volunteers.

Request Free IT Support at Home | AbilityNet

AbilityNet's friendly tech volunteers provide free IT support to older people and disabled people of any age, anywhere in the UK.

abilitynet.org.uk

KMorr said:
The main issue we have is with passwords and emails!

I've a feeling that being helped with initial setting everything up may be of limited use.
Your Dad seems to have forgotten what he used to do, is it reasonable to expect him to remember new instructions?

A password may not be enough to get onto a site, he may be asked for selected characters out of a string, his first pet, ....... He could be asked to do a 'handshake' with text, phone message, or email.

Would the volunteer be happy, or even allowed , to be given sensitive passwords etc?

Assuming your Dad gets onto a site will he be able to navigate round a site and make sensible decisions?

KMorr said :
the best systems in place to help him and my mum and that we could help from further away

You could take remote control.
Not sure of how some financial institutions would react to him sharing passwords etc with you.

 

[KMorr]

Thanks for your reply. He still manages reasonably well with some tasks, what we would like to see is him agreeing to do tasks jointly with my mum now so we need to simplify things so she can increase her skills. I’m hoping this will be a compromise to maintain some of his independence and ensure things are done safely. He is a ‘tinkerer’ with the computer and always has been and has a thing about sorting things into folders but he’s over complicating things and isn’t able to do this anymore and therefore gets in a bit of a guddle! We are still early stages so his decision making skills are still intact.

 

[nitram]

You could decide which tasks are essential and which are peripheral and see if mum can be taught how to do the essential ones dad's way although

KMorr said:
he’s over complicating things and isn’t able to do this anymore and therefore gets in a bit of a guddle!

suggests that dad may not be able to tutor mum.

KMorr said:
has a thing about sorting things into folders

Nothing wrong with a good folder structure, just looked at 'my documents', 4075 files in 170 folders.
Mum will find things very difficult unless she gets to grips with his structure which until recently has been satisfactory.