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Caregiver's e-Mall

Our Caregiver's e-Mall is filling up with great stores and a growing number of items just in time for the holidays. Whether you browse and find a book or tape to help you with caregiving, or come across a wonderful gift for a friend or family member, the e-Mall can be your source for easy shopping and gift-giving.

So, click on the dark blue Caregiver's e-Mall buttons throughout our site and enter a comfortable, secure shopping experience with major merchants while avoiding the hassle of having to find a parking place or matching your shopping hours with someone else's. Our mall is just a click away and is open 24 hours every day.

Watch for additional stores opening in the e-Mall soon!

Writers' Guidelines for Article Submission

The Caregiver’s Home Companion publishes articles devoted to helping family caregivers improve the quality of life for themselves and their loved ones. We look at situations covering long- and short-term disabilities involving parents, siblings, spouses, uncles and aunts. Primarily, however, we focus on children taking care of elderly parents.

Our content is a combination of assigned articles and topics as well as unsolicited submissions.

Our Audience

Our primary reading audience is family caregivers, although eldercare professionals also read our publications in notable numbers. However, the focus of all articles is on the family caregiver.

We strive to maintain respect and consideration for both the eldercare professional and the family caregiver who want to effectively work together in improving the quality of life for all concerned. Our emphasis is on family over clinical experience. Personal anecdotes, quotes, or sidebars are encouraged because they bring the articles to life. As journalists, we examine ALL sides of issues facing the caregiver.

Our tone is professional and generally upbeat, but we also recognize that our audience is no stranger to difficulties and realities of the caregiving role, and we therefore do not ignore these aspects.

We prefer that all submissions be from current or former caregivers, healthcare professionals working with caregivers and their loved ones, or individuals heavily involved with caregiving.

In all cases, we prefer stories based on real life experiences. Stories should focus on linking challenges facing the caregiver with tested solutions, preferably experienced by the writer himself or herself. This fits in well with our frequent “How I Cope” first-person features.

Article Style

Familiarize yourself with the publication and website before querying. If you are not a subscriber with access to The Caregiver's Home Companion and would like to review the newsletter, send a check for $4.95 to the mailing address below

We use language geared toward the consumer/reader who has a high-school diploma (i.e., McCall's, Woman's Day, Newsweek) as opposed to professional, medical or business journals (i.e., JAMA, Business Week, New England Journal of Medicine).

Where professional terms or jargon and specialized terminology are used, it must be immediately and clearly explained in a manner that is not condescending. If there is a term caregivers will likely face in caregiving, i.e. incontinence, it should be explained in the article.

Each article should include a list of resources for caregivers to follow up for more information. These resources (a minimum of three per article) should include the name of the organization or resource, a contact person (if available) and a phone number, email address and web site address. The writer should have verified all aspects of reaching the resource before submitting information.

Because our readers may be taking care of a sibling or relatives other than parents, we prefer the term “loved one” unless we are dealing with a specific situation involving a parent. For example, “The Child Becomes the Parent of the Father.”

We generally avoid discussion of what could have been done to prevent a disability or declining elderly condition. Our readers are interested in what they can do now that they are in the day-to-day care situation.

We also are interested in solving financial, emotional, sexual, or other issues not normally covered by publications. Caregiving involves family relationships, financial hardships and other issues not generally discussed in similar publications. To make The Caregiver’s Home Companion most valuable to our readers, we are dedicated to addressing all these relevant issues.

It is best when doing this to include comments from professionals – legal, healthcare, government and others – who might shed light and understanding in these areas. Unless you are an authority yourself, articles should include a minimum of three interviews, with direct quotes.

If you write about a loved one with a specific disability, it should be worded in such a way that it reaches out to all families who have a similar situation. Always think of a story as containing information affecting many families and not just the specific situation or experience you are highlighting. Try to universalize the suggestions you provide and definitely provide short, bulleted “to do” lists.

When discussing medicines or treatment, please use the scientific and brand names of products and drugs. Think to yourself, "What information can my story contain that will be of use to other caregivers?"

The approach our publication takes is:

1. Caregivers must become experts on their own situation, and they read our publications for help in the form of information, resources and support that help them become such experts.

2. Every article we publish should offer practical information and advice that readers can use to make life easier, happier and healthier when caring for a loved one.

3. We view our publication as a valuable resource that helps readers better use this nation’s extensive and growing eldercare network.

4. We believe it is possible to help caregivers better communicate with educational and healthcare professionals to help their loved ones and themselves.

Technical Hints

We adhere to The Associated Press Stylebook as our guide for writing, grammar, style and editing. You should be familiar with AP style. If you are not, go to this address for more information: http://www.apstylebook.com/.
Disorders, diseases and disabilities are used in lower case, unless they are "named for" someone. Therefore, we capitalize Alzheimer’s and we use “multiple sclerosis” in the lower case because it defines a condition.

Please be sure to spell-check your article before sending it to us!

All articles must be written in the Microsoft Word software program

All articles should be submitted as an email attachment – and you must verify in your cover email that the attachment has been scanned successfully for viruses.

Fact checking is absolutely paramount! Be sure to check and double-check all names, dates, and addresses.

Please be thorough -- the more accurate the information, the more professional your article will be.

We prefer articles of 800-1,000 words. Sidebars are welcome in the 200-300 word range.

Please indicate if there is any artwork (art is: jpegs, bmps, gifs, printed pictures, paper-copy illustrations, slides, and transparencies) that could accompany the article if selected for publication. It is not necessary to send artwork with the submitted manuscript, but a brief description or photocopies of the artwork will help us determine whether we are interested in using it.

Please remember to include your brief author "bio" information. This information consists of the name, location and pertinent background of the author. This should be no longer than three or four sentences. We would also like to include an email address so readers can reach you directly. (You may want to set up a separate account for this.)

Copy should be provided in a Microsoft Word compatible program ONLY. Copy should be sent to: editor@caregivershome.com.

The review process can vary from six days to two weeks. All submissions will be answered. The Caregiver’s Home Companion pays up to $100 for published submissions based on length, illustrations and value of the submission. Payment rates are determined at the sole discretion of the editors. Payment is made upon publication.

Photos: The Caregiver’s Home Companion accepts only scanned photos and charts with an accompanying file that has clearly labeled the name(s) of the person/people, the activity, or the subject-matter shown. This is so the pictures and/or illustrations can be easily captioned and fit into the story. Put names in order of appearance in pictures. For example, “Mary (right) and Henry (left).” People should be identified by name, relationship, home address (city/state), age, and the relevant activity in which they are engaged.

All submitted pictures must have a permission/release form signed and dated by all picture subjects. If we choose to use a photo, we will ask you to send the permission form to us.

The address is:

Pederson Publishing, Inc.
P.O. Box 693
Southport, Connecticut 06890-0693

Include with your article a list of all sources you contacted, their telephone numbers, and copies of any materials you used (i.e., an article from another magazine, a photocopy of a technical or medical definition).

We also need the addresses of all those mentioned in the article so that a copy of the newsletter can be sent to them. We supply each author with two copies free. Additional copies are available upon request at $1 each.