For trusted companion care in Lakewood and the rest of East Dallas, Senior Care of North Texas is a locally owned, Texas-licensed agency (License #020448). One matched employee caregiver drives your parent to the Lakewood Shopping Center, the doctor on Gaston or a walk at White Rock Lake, gives medication reminders and logs them, cooks, keeps the house tidy and keeps your parent company, at one flat $30–34 an hour. Call (214) 550-6533, answered 24/7.
Picture a common situation. Your mother has lived in the same Lakewood house for most of her adult life. Some of the parents we visit here have been in theirs for fifty years. She gave up the car keys last spring. The grocery store and the pharmacy at the Lakewood Shopping Center are only a few minutes away, but a few minutes by car is a long way without one. The pill organizer by the sink is half right on a good week, lunch is crackers, and she has not been to the lake since the fall. She is not sick. She needs someone for the ordinary parts of the week, and you need to hear how those days went. That is companion care for seniors, and this guide answers the questions East Dallas families ask before they hire it.
Who can you trust with companion care in Lakewood, Dallas?
Most Lakewood families know someone on the street who found a caregiver through a neighbor or a church friend and paid her privately. It can work well for months. The trouble starts on the first day she is sick, on vacation, or simply gone. Then your family is the employer, with no backup and nobody to call.
So the useful test for any agency is not what happens on a good Tuesday. It is what happens on a bad one. Put these situations to every agency you call, and to any private caregiver you are considering.
What happens when something changes
| When this happens | Caregiver hired privately | Senior Care of North Texas |
|---|---|---|
| The caregiver is sick on a visit day | The family finds cover or the visit is missed | We send another employee caregiver who already has the care plan |
| The caregiver takes a vacation | The same gap, often for a week or more | Cover from our own team, arranged by us |
| Your parent and the caregiver do not get along | An awkward conversation, then a new search | You call and we make a new match, with no explanation needed |
| Your parent later needs help in the shower | Depends on what one person is willing and trained to do | Personal care is added at the same hourly rate, with no levels of care |
| Payroll, insurance and background checks | Your family handles them as the employer | Our employees: background-checked, insured and supervised by us |
| Something needs fixing at 9pm | You sort it out | Our phone is answered 24/7, and families can call Ryan, our co-owner, directly |
How to read this table: the private route often looks cheaper per hour, and on an ordinary week it can be. The right-hand column is what you are paying for: the bad weeks are covered by someone other than you.
Three more things are worth getting in writing before anyone comes to the house: the hourly rate, the state license number, and the name of the person who will do the first visit. Ours are $30–34 an hour, Texas Personal Assistance Services License #020448, and Ryan Berry, who does every free in-home assessment himself.
Which home care agencies provide senior transportation and errands in Lakewood, Dallas?
We do, inside every companion visit and as a service of its own, transportation and errands for seniors. The caregiver drives your parent's car or her own, whichever your family prefers, and we go through the details in plain numbers at the assessment. In Lakewood, the errand map is short and familiar:
- The Lakewood Shopping Center at Gaston and Abrams, for the grocery store and the pharmacy.
- The doctor at Baylor's medical offices on Gaston, near Baylor University Medical Center.
- The hairdresser on Abrams, the bank and the post office.
- Church on Sunday, or coffee at a friend's house.
The difference from a rideshare is the front door. The caregiver helps your parent get ready, steadies her on the walk to the car, stays through the outing and sees her back inside. At a medical appointment she can help with check-in and, with your parent's permission, sit in on the visit and write down what the doctor says, so the instructions reach you instead of getting lost on the drive home. We take notes for the family; we do not give medical advice.
On days your parent would rather stay in, the caregiver runs the list alone: groceries, prescriptions, dry cleaning, the post office. We are not medical transport. If your parent needs a wheelchair van, a stretcher or oxygen management on the way, we will say so honestly and help you find the right service.
The outings that are not errands
East Dallas has two of the best places in the city for a short, slow outing. A walk along White Rock Lake, or an afternoon at the Dallas Arboretum on Garland Road, is a good morning for someone who needs to keep moving and see people. For a parent who has given up the keys, outings like these are what keep the week from shrinking to the living room. Our guide to loneliness in older adults explains why the outing matters as much as the groceries.
Who offers medication reminders and daily check-ins for seniors in Lakewood, Dallas?
We do, on every visit where the schedule calls for a dose. Our medication reminders work from a pill organizer, blister pack or written list that your family, the pharmacy or a home health nurse has already prepared. At the right time, the caregiver brings it to your parent, offers a glass of water and food if the dose needs it, watches that the dose is taken and writes it in a log your family can check.
That is the whole job, and the limits are part of it. Under our non-medical license, the caregiver reminds and logs. She does not fill the organizer, hand out loose pills, adjust a dose, give an injection or decide anything about medication. If your parent refuses a dose, the caregiver does not force it or hide it in food. It goes in the log, and you hear about it the same day so you and the doctor can decide what to do.
One small piece makes the reminders work in Lakewood: when a bottle or blister pack is running low, the caregiver tells you before it runs out. Once the refill is ready, the pharmacy at the Lakewood Shopping Center becomes part of the next errand run.
What a check-in is with a four-hour visit
Families often ask for a quick daily check-in. Our minimum visit is four hours, so a check-in with us is a real visit, built around the time of day that matters most. In those hours the caregiver confirms your parent is up and dressed, has eaten, has taken the doses and that the house is in order, and then sends your family an update.
Tell us at the assessment how you want to hear it: a short message after every visit, a call only when something changes, or both. On the days between visits, a family phone call still has a job, and the log tells you what to ask about.
Which senior care company provides meal preparation and light housekeeping in Lakewood, Dallas?
We do, through meal preparation and light housekeeping, and in most companion visits the two happen together. The caregiver cooks in your parent's own kitchen, food your parent actually likes, following any written diet guidance from the family or the doctor. Your parent gets a say in the menu, or a place at the counter if she still likes to cook.
- Hot meals cooked fresh: breakfast, lunch or dinner.
- Prep-ahead: labeled meals for the days between visits.
- Groceries: shopping from a list, putting food away and clearing out what has expired.
- Water: gentle reminders to drink through the visit.
- Company at the table: the caregiver sits down and eats too, because most people eat more when they are not eating alone.
Housekeeping covers the rooms your parent lives in: dishes and counters, laundry and fresh bed linens, a bathroom wipe-down and the trash. In an older Lakewood house, one line on that list matters more than the rest: keeping floors and walkways clear. Polished wood floors and a step between rooms are part of the charm of these houses, and a stray cord or a pile of mail on that route is exactly what the caregiver moves out of the way. Where the bedroom is upstairs, she also carries the laundry basket and the clean sheets up and down the staircase, so your parent does not.
Light housekeeping is not a cleaning service. Deep cleaning, windows, gutters, carpets and yard work stay with a cleaning company or the yard crew you already use. Our guide to what a caregiver does in a meal and housekeeping visit goes through the full list.
What does a week of companion care look like in East Dallas?
Every plan is written around one parent's routine, so treat this as an example, not a package. Here is how three four-hour visits a week, 12 hours in all, can cover the parent in the story above:
- Monday morning: the medication reminder at breakfast, then groceries and the pharmacy at the Lakewood Shopping Center, lunch cooked at home and eaten together, and a load of laundry.
- Wednesday: the doctor at Baylor's offices on Gaston, with notes written for the family, a stop for a refill on the way back, and two dinners cooked and labeled for later in the week.
- Friday: the hairdresser on Abrams, then a slow walk at White Rock Lake or an hour at the Arboretum if the weather is kind, and a meal prepped for the weekend.
Between visits, the family calls, and the caregiver's notes tell everyone what happened. If a week like this works, many families keep it for a long time. If your parent needs more, the next step is usually a visit every weekday morning, built around the morning doses. For a closer look at how the hours inside one visit actually get used, see a four-hour home care visit, hour by hour.
Companion care is also the easy way in for a parent who says she does not need help. Few people turn down someone who drives them to the hairdresser and cooks lunch. Starting with one visit a week lets your parent stay in charge of her own days, which is usually what the resistance was about.
Which parts of East Dallas do we cover?
All of Lakewood, the streets between Gaston Avenue and White Rock Lake with Abrams Road running through the middle, plus the M Streets and Greenland Hills to the west, Hollywood Heights and Junius Heights to the south, and the lake neighborhoods to the east. That is the 75214, 75206 and 75218 ZIP codes. See home care in Lakewood for the full neighborhood page, and Lake Highlands, north of the lake, has its own page.
The caregivers who serve East Dallas drive Gaston, Abrams, Mockingbird and Garland Road every week. That is what makes a morning start on Lakewood Boulevard, or a same-day extra visit near the lake in a hard week, realistic rather than a promise on paper.
We serve families across Dallas–Fort Worth, not only East Dallas. The same agency covers nearby Preston Hollow and the Park Cities, including Highland Park as well, with the same rate and the same rules.
What does companion care cost in Lakewood?
Our rate is one flat $30–34 an hour, the same for days, evenings, weekends and overnights. The minimum visit is four hours. Major holidays bill at time and a half, and we tell you which days count before you book. There is no assessment fee, no registration fee, no long-term contract, and no levels-of-care pricing, so if your parent later needs hands-on help, the hourly rate does not rise. When one caregiver helps both parents in the same home, a couples discount applies.
These are the monthly estimates from our published in-home care rates for Dallas–Fort Worth, based on about 4.3 weeks a month:
- 4 hours a week (one visit): about $520–590 a month.
- 12 hours a week (the three-visit week above): about $1,560–1,770 a month.
- 20 hours a week (every weekday morning): about $2,610–2,960 a month.
- 40 hours a week (eight hours a day, five days): about $5,190–5,880 a month.
Long-term care insurance policies often cover non-medical home care, and we help with the claim paperwork. The free assessment ends with an exact quote in writing.
Why do Lakewood families choose Senior Care of North Texas?
Because the answers to the questions in this guide are already written down, and they stay the same after you sign:
- We are locally owned and independent, not a franchise.
- Caregivers are our own employees: background-checked, insured and supervised.
- We match one caregiver to your parent, the same person comes back, and you can ask for a different caregiver at any time.
- Ryan Berry, co-owner, comes to the house in Lakewood for the free assessment, usually the same day or the next morning.
- We are rated 4.9 stars across 44 Google reviews and licensed by the State of Texas, License #020448.
- Care can often start within 24 hours, and the phone is answered 24/7.
Start with one visit a week of companion care in Dallas and add visits as the routine settles. Call (214) 550-6533 or request a free in-home assessment. Ryan will listen, look at the house and the week with you, and write the first plan at the kitchen table. How care starts lays out every step.
This guide is general information, not medical advice. Questions about medications or your parent's health belong with the physician.
