How do you help a lonely elderly person?

Not everyone who lives alone is lonely, and not everyone who is lonely says so. Some people are content with their own company and see fewer people from choice, and that is worth respecting rather than fixing. The signs worth noticing are a change from how someone used to be: they stop mentioning the things they used to do, the same television programme is on every time you call, or they ring you several times in an evening for no particular reason. That last one is common, and it usually means the evenings are the hard part, not that anything urgent is wrong.

If loneliness has gone on for months rather than weeks, the physical and mental health risks above are the reason to treat it as seriously as any other symptom your parent might have. The link between isolation and dementia risk specifically is covered in more depth in can a lack of social interaction cause dementia?

This is one way a week could be covered, not a template to copy exactly. The pattern that matters is the mix: a short daily point of contact does more for loneliness than one long visit a fortnight, because the gaps in between are where it sets in. A phone call is a real visit if a face-to-face one is not possible, whether that is because family live a distance away or because someone cannot get out that day, and companionship for someone who is housebound covers the weeks when getting out is not possible at all. Where a stroke has taken somebody's words, the telephone is the part that stops working first, and how to talk to someone with aphasia covers what helps in a conversation instead. Hearing loss can cut off the telephone too, and hearing loss and care at home covers amplified phones and ways of talking that help.

To put names to those: The Silver Line, Age UK's befriending services, Re-engage, u3a and the UK Men's Sheds Association are all free to try, and a shed is worth mentioning to an older man who turns down company but might say yes to something to do. NHS England's social prescribing service explains how a GP referral works, and what a GP link worker can connect your parent to covers what happens after it. None of these need a diagnosis or a crisis to ask for, and what each free route costs, how you get it and how long it takes to start sets them beside a paid companion.

What technology helps an older person live alone covers alarms and monitoring as well as calling, if safety at home is the bigger worry.

A single weekly visit is enough for some families, filling the one day nobody else can cover, and where your parent is newly on their own after a husband or wife has died, the first year alone and what helps covers that stretch in particular. If loneliness is constant rather than occasional, because your parent is alone for most of every day, live-in companionship is worth reading about too: the carer lives in, so there is company throughout the day rather than for an hour at a time.