https://www.financialexpress.com/money/8-step-action-plan-to-secure-the-future-of-special-needs-child/1267356/ucweb/?uc_news_item_id=3251366495311472

I am copying the content here (to ensure content is not lost as links can stop working after some time)

8-step action plan to secure the future of special needs child

 
Financial Express

Author

By drawing a proper financial plan, the parents of a special needs child can reduce some of their worries.

A Will is necessary to ensure the assets you leave for the child are bequeathed to the trust.

A Will is necessary to ensure the assets you leave for the child are bequeathed to the trust.

All parents usually worry about the future of their children. How will they provide for their children’s education, how to give them a quality life, etc. However, when there is a child with special needs, the concerns extend beyond the college education or marriage.

1. Where will the child reside when parents are not there?

2. Who will pay for the child’s lifetime care expenses?

3. Who will ensure the child adapts to the changing environment?

4. Once an adult, who will take care of the child’s changing needs?

The above concerns are primary for parents with special needs children. When these concerns remain unaddressed, it becomes difficult for the family to plan for their child’s future. By drawing a proper financial plan, the parents of a special needs child can reduce some of these worries.

Here is an 8-step action plan for the family to plan for their financial future. Some of these action plans would require some cost to bear such as the legal cost. Contrary to this, some actions may demand adjustment in life, which is always a challenge. So, it’s important that parents start thinking on these lines.

1. Write a Letter of Intent: It’s not a legal document, but surely a guiding resource for future caretakers. This document passes on the vital information about your child to the future guardian/trustees. Parents should write about child’s daily living, his behavior, likes and dislikes, education, professionals and institutions etc. Even persons the child is uncomfortable with can be included. Once in a year update this letter for change in any of the information it includes.

2. Create a Will and Trust: A Will is necessary to ensure the assets you leave for the child are bequeathed to the trust. Moreover for child minority parents can appoint a guardian through the Will. Simultaneously a trust ensures the protection of assets for your special needs child. The money you will save or the gift/inheritance received by the child can go directly into the trust. Forming the trust today even if you are not able to fund it will benefit. The life insurance can be assigned to the trust and your estate can be bequeathed to t when you die.

3. Identify the Guardian and Trustees: The guardian has his responsibility much like you. He will have to make adjustment in his own life to ensure the special needs child care is continued without any hurdles. If you have identified such a person, appoint him guardian in your Will till the child minority. The consent of the guardian is important. Similarly, trustees are persons who will ensure the trust assets are utilized for the benefit of child. Hence identifying trustees who can act in a fiduciary role is important and should be done today.

4. Estimate the Lifetime cost: Identifying the cost for the lifetime care of the child is necessary. This cost should cover not only the financial requirement but also the legal aspect. The financial assessment is possible only when parents have an estimation of the child’s expenses. Most do not have it as it is part of the family expenses. It then becomes ideal to create a budget and identify the child’s expenses separately to bring accuracy in estimating the lifetime cost. Apart from this, any cost which may be incurred for addressing uncertainties in life should be taken into consideration and included.

5. Identify available support: Parents need to understand the support their child will receive from the government, family members, relatives, friends, and others. Analyze all such support and start preparing for the shortfall. Most importantly account for the benefits the child will actually receive.

6. Start Investing: The insurance will not be available after a certain age and may not be enough otherwise. That’s where your personal savings will be important. Start setting aside some amount for building a corpus for your special needs child. This corpus may be needed for multiple expenses which may include legal cost, professionals and funding expenses in later years of life.

7. Identify Residential Needs: When the child turns an adult then the need of a residential house arises. It may be a separate house from your existing one or you may have to adjust. As the child reaches 15-16 years start thinking about the residential requirement. Where he will live after you, is your locality equipped with the programs for special needs adult? If your child has to be independent, you search for options.

8. Talk to family members and future caretakers: It’s important that family members are aware about the requirements of your special needs child. They will be the ones who will be a guiding support after you. Talk to them and discuss. Also, they need to be educated how things should be done if they wish for your child. Any amount should be gifted to the trust and not to the child. Similarly, consent of all future caretakers is necessary along with their understanding of your child’s needs. Parents should talks to the identified persons to ensure they are in sync with your vision for the child.

Lack of information forces families to avoid planning. But it’s important that families take this step early in life as wealth building needs time. Lastly, if all of these look tough to plan, hire a financial planner who is well conversant with special needs’ requirements.

(By Jitendra P. S Solanki, a Sebi-registered Investment Adviser and author of the book ‘Financial Planning for Families Having Children with Special Needs’)

Alzheimer's related - Tongue Exercise

BELOW IS A FORWARDED POST RECEIVED IN WHATSAPP


The tongue exercise is effective to reduce the onset of Alzheimer's and is also useful to reduce / improve

1 Body weight
2 Hypertension
3 Blood-Clot in Brain
4 Asthma
5 Far-sightedness
6 Ear buzzing
7 Throat infection
8 Shoulder / Neck infection
9 Insomia

The moves  are very simple and easy to learn....

Each morning, when you wash your face, in front of a mirror, do the exercise as below :

stretch out your tongue and move it to the right then to the left for 10 times

Since I started exercising my tongue daily,  there was improvement in my Brain Retention.

My mind was clear and fresh and there were other improvements too...

   1 Far sightedness
        lesser
   2  No giddiness
   3. Improved wellness
   4. Better digestion
   5. Lesser flu / cold

I am stronger and more agile.

🎀 Notes

The tongue exercise helps to control and prevent Alzheimer's...
Medical research has found that the tongue has connection with the BIG Brain. When our body becomes old and weak, the first sign to appear is that our tongue becomes stiff and often we tend to bite ourselves.

Frequently exercising your tongue
will stimulate the brain,
help to reduce our thoughts from shrinking and thus achieve a healthier body.

After we die, who takes care of our challenged child? Home sweet home

https://indianexpress.com/article/india/after-we-die-who-takes-care-of-our-challenged-child-home-sweet-home-5215085/

For years, retired school teachers N Kamalasan (77) and C K Sarojini (71) worried about the future of their only daughter, an intellectually challenged person. Who would take care of her once they were gone?

Last Friday, the couple found an answer. They handed over one of their houses to the Kerala government, asking it to convert the property into a centre for challenged women and accommodate their 37-year-old daughter at that facility.

Accepting the demand of Kamalasan, the Kerala Social Welfare Department took over the building and 83 cents of land at Kayila village in Kollam district. The property, with a two-storeyed house, has a market value of Rs 3 crore.

Social Welfare Minister K K Shylaja said the house would soon be converted into a rehabilitation centre for intellectually challenged women. At present, the house can accommodate ten people. It will be furnished with facilities for 50 women.

On the request of Kamalasan and Sarojini, the house will be named after their daughter Priya — Priya Home for Mentally Challenged Women. The house, the minister said, will ensure a homely atmosphere for its residents. They will also get medical care at the house, Shylaja said.

This gesture of the elderly couple did not end there. They wrote a will, saying the government can take over their two other houses and 15 cents of land in Kozhikode which will fetch a market price of Rs 4 crore. They are now living in one of these two houses in Kozhikode. According to the will, these houses will have to be used for the rehabilitation of the intellectually challenged.

Kamalasan said he had worried about the future of their daughter. “If she is handed over to the custody of relatives, there is no guarantee that they will look after her. We have several instances of mentally challenged persons being killed by relatives to seize the property left behind by their parents.’’

He said he had been knocking on the door of the Social Welfare Department to take over his house in Kollam and make it a residential project for the intellectually challenged. “The government action has come as a big relief. The government has promised to make the house ready for challenged women. We will have nothing to worry. Our daughter can be quickly moved to that house. She can live in a homely atmosphere. Otherwise, she may have had to wander after our death,” he said.

He said scores of intellectually challenged persons in Kerala have been left on the streets after the death of their parents. “I wanted to bring their woes to the public sphere. I hope wealthy families come forward to make such homes ready for their intellectually-challenged wards as well as for others from economically weaker sections, ‘’ Kamalasan said.

A survey conducted by the Kerala Social Security Mission in 2015 revealed that 2.21 per cent of the state’s population is challenged, either physically or mentally.

Kerala Mental Health Authority Secretary Dr Jayaprakash said the gesture of Kamalasan and his wife is worth emulating. “Many parents of challenged children die with the pain that there is none to take care of them (the children). This type of voluntary initiative will help address the issue,” he said.

Stem cell therapy related news - Macular degeneration: 'I've been given my sight back'

http://www.bbc.com/news/health-43458365

Douglas Waters, 86, could not see out of his right eye, but "I can now read the newspaper" with it, he says.
He was one of two patients given pioneering stem cell therapy at Moorfields Eye Hospital in London.
Cells from a human embryo were grown into a patch that was delicately inserted into the back of the eye.

https://www.moorfields.nhs.uk/londonproject

Gene Therapy related

New device can heal with a single touch, and even repair brain injuries

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation-now/2017/08/07/miracle-device-can-heal-single-touch-and-even-repair-brain-injuries/537326001/

The technology, known as Tissue Nanotransfection (TNT), has the potential to save the lives of car crash victims and even deployed soldiers injured on site. It's a dime-sized silicone chip that "injects genetic code into skin cells, turning those skin cells into other types of cells required for treating diseased conditions," according to a release.

http://www.dispatch.com/news/20170807/ohio-state-researchers-report-breakthrough-in-cell-regeneration

In what researchers consider a major scientific leap, a team at Ohio State University has discovered a new way of turning skin cells into any type of cells the body might need, a technology that has limitless potential, from regenerating a wounded limb to repairing a brain after stroke to healing a damaged heart.

...

While it hasn’t been used in humans yet, the process was used in animals to heal brains after stroke and to generate blood vessels in legs where the femoral artery, the limbs’ major blood supply, had been cut, said Chandan Sen, the director of the Center for Regenerative Medicine and Cell-Based Therapies at Ohio State’s Wexner Medical Center. 

... 

 

In brain experiments on mice, the chip was again placed on the leg, different genetic material was dropped on, and neurological cells grew in the area. Three weeks later, scientists detected firing neurons, and the new cells were taken from the leg and inserted into the brain. 

US doctors reverse brain damage in drowned toddler

US doctors reverse brain damage in drowned toddler
http://indianexpress.com/article/lifestyle/health/us-doctors-reverse-brain-damage-in-drowned-toddler-4763583/

Excerpt:

Doctors in the US have successfully reversed brain damage in a two-year-old who became unresponsive to all stimuli after a drowning accident. The girl experienced cardiac arrest after a cold water drowning accident in a swimming pool. After resuscitation at Arkansas Children’s Hospital in the US, MRI revealed deep brain injury as well as grey and white matter loss.

She had no speech, gait or responsiveness to commands, and was constantly squirming and shaking her head. Since hyperbaric oxygen therapy was not available in the patient’s location, doctors at Louisiana State University Health Sciences Center in the US began a bridging treatment to prevent permanent tissue degeneration until they could get the patient to a hyperbaric treatment center.

Fifty-five days post-drowning, they began short duration treatment with 100 per cent normobaric oxygen for 45 minutes twice a day through a nasal cannula. The girl became more alert, awake and stopped squirming, doctors said.

Her rate of neurological improvement increased amd she started laughing, increased movement of arms, hands, and taking some food orally. She also showed pre-drowning speech level, but with diminished vocabulary.

The patient and family then traveled to New Orleans 78 days after drowning, where doctors began treating her with hyperbaric oxygen therapy (HBOT). She “dove” in a hyperbaric chamber for 45 minutes a day, five days a week for 40 sessions.

“At the beginning of each session, the patient showed visually apparent and/or physical examination-documented neurological improvement,” doctors said.