The Over-Medicalization of Aging
At what point, as we age, do we become accepting of aches and pains –aging that is — and stop thinking about rushing to a physician all of the time? How do we decide whether or not to fix a problem if it has more to do with the later years of our life than with a traditional medical ailment? Can we depend on our physicians to clearly tell us when a medical problem is as easily addressed by physical therapy as by a surgical procedure of some type — especially when there are low-tech ways to improve the situation.
These are questions for our elder parents to consider; however, those of us who are older adult children also need to think about them. The medicalization of our aging — the tendency of the medical community to always to have a procedure or surgery that purports to solve a problem — potentially exposes seniors to more and more risks without really solving the problems.
To think about future medical problems in the abstract is easy but so much more difficult when they actually occur and become more personal. Aren’t we really turning our later years into big medical procedure-filled adventures rather than accepting that predictable problems will develop as we age — problems that reflect more about the way about our bodies slowing down and less about true medical issues?
An article in the February 20, 2012 Washington Post Health section features an interview with physician Norton M. Hadler, the author of Rethinking Aging, Growing Old and Living Well in an Overtreated Society. It’s worth reading this article and maybe even the book. Read and excerpt from the book.
Duplicate Discharge Orders for Elderly Seniors to Adult Child
One page of the discharge orders from my mom's emergency visit. Because it was not too serious, I visited a day or two later. Her fall resulted in a short hospitalization about two weeks later.
In this day of electronic medical records, EMR’s for short, why can’t a hospital with an e-mail or fax number on file send off a copy of the discharge orders to the adult child designated by the elder parent?
Given that the private sector has figured out a way to help adult children keep track of utility bills and bank accounts, it seems like it might be easy to implement, even while keeping privacy considerations front and center.
The opportunity to read and understand the diagnosis and the specific steps that are required for recovery would help an adult children, who cannot always be right at a parent’s side, stay informed and take more knowledgeable steps to help an elder parent recover.
How about it hospitals?
More Men are Becoming Caregivers
Click to read the Chicago Tribune article.
The Chicago Tribune has a story today (Valentine’s Day, 2012) about men who are caring for family members. In The Increasing Male Face of Caregiving Doug Wyman, who is semi-retired from a career in sales and marketing, explains how he assists his wife, who has Alzheimer’s disease. The couple has been married for 63 years.
Written by Chicago Tribune reporter Vikki Ortiz Healy the article describes the changing face of caregiving, and some of the reasons why more men are assuming the role more now than they used to in the past
A short, and compelling video, featuring the Wymans, leads off the article, but a brief advertisement runs before the real content begins.
Most Interesting Quote
In the last 15 years, the number of men caring for loved ones with Alzheimer’s or dementia has more than doubled, from 19 to 40 percent, according to the Alzheimer’s Association. The trend corresponds to the higher number of women over the age of 65 in the U.S. with the disease — 3.4 million, compared with 1.8 million men. Those demographics have changed the tone of local support group meetings by adding a chorus of male perspectives
Other Resources to Read About Men and Caregiving
- Men as Caregivers – AgingCare.com
- Men are Caregivers, Too - MedicineNet
- Caregiving: It’s Different for Men – AARP
- Life With Father – A great blog by a son who provides care for his dad.
Low Sodium Diet #IX: Making Choices that Lower the Count
Physicians are asking many of our parents to lower their sodium intake, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention offers some education materials and tips.
The CDC’s monthly public health program, Vital Signs, provides detailed information on public health issues, and its mission is to encourage people to take steps that change behavior and help them lead healthier lives.
The February 2012 report focuses on lowering dietary sodium and includes a downloadable fact sheet with most of the educational information on the Vital Signs site. The graphic below comes from the sodium tip sheet, also downloadable, that illustrates steps that an individual can take to lower daily sodium intake.
The trick, of course, is finding these lower-sodium products in the grocery store, especially challenging for elders, who are less able to go to several stores to locate the appropriate foods.
Different Falls – Different Interventions
If you have aging parents who falls — and recently one of my parents took a spill — read the article about senior falling in the September 2010 Journal of the American Geriatrics Society. Mobilize Boston, the organization that conducted the research stated on its website that, ”The purpose of the study is to collect information that will help us learn how older adults can maintain their health and independence longer.” The article abstract is free, but the article itself requires payment (or you can visit the library at your local hospital).
Identifying the differences between senior falls that occurred inside and those that occurred outside, the Mobilize Boston Study followed a cohort of 765 randomly selected men and women, most over 70 years old. Researchers collected data through questionnaires and medical examinations. During a median follow-up period of 21.7 months, 1,122 total falls occurred, consisting of 598 indoors and 524 outdoors. All study participants were Boston, Massachusetts residents, and they reported falls as they occurred.
Helping Parents Stay Out of a Nursing Home?
The Chicago Tribune and Los Angeles Times recently published an instructive article explaining in detail what adult children can do to help our parents stay out of nursing homes.
Written by Karen Ravn, the article suggests focusing on nine specific issues that make an enormous difference in the safety and security of a senior parent’s home environment — where most elders want to live as long as they can.
Best Quote in the Article
According to Dr. David Reuben, Geriatrics Chief at UCLA’s Department of Medicine, “… there’s always a tension between autonomy and safety. Children may want to err on the side of safety, but parents may want to err on the side of autonomy.”
One of the reasons that I am so excited about the Green House® Homes construction at Virginia Mennonite Retirement Community (VMRC), where my parents live, is the added option that these new dwellings will provide for my family, should one of my parents be unable to continue living at home. While their goal (and mine) is for them to continue living at home, we do not know what may happen to alter our plans, so it’s wonderful to have a care option that is not a nursing home. Moreover, one of the many advantages of Green House® Homes is that a key part of the mission is to help elders maintain their autonomy.
These four As Our Parents Age posts describe the process at VMRC. Watch for more that describe the construction. Read more »
Dementia Reality Tour
Click to visit the slide show.
An article in the San Jose Mercury News describes a multi-sensory experience that simulates the perceptions and struggles of a person suffering from dementia. In Santa Clara ‘Dementia Reality Tour’ Shows What It’s Like to Live with the Affliction, Mercury News reporter Helen Shen describes how the simulation asks caregivers to complete routine activities of daily living (ADLs) while wearing gloves, goggles, socks, and certain accouterments that approximate the perceptions of a person with the brain disease.
Rick Carson of Immersion Reality Education designed the activities for family members to give them a sense of what it’s really like. The article includes reactions from many family members who find that the activities are helping them gain more understanding of their family member with dementia.
Read the story and take a few minutes to look at the slide show of participants completing the various tasks.
Middle Age, Senior Years, Elder Years, REPEAT or RERUN
A view from my kayak - summer 2008
My husband and I are empty nesters. Over these past few years, as blog readers know, we helped to support his parents, now deceased. These days we regularly touch base with my parents by phone and in person as often as possible, and though they are currently independent and active, at times they welcome our help.
Now we, too, are also beginning to think about retirement, and it’s never far from our thoughts. Even with no specific deadlines and daily jobs we really like, even as time passes in a relaxed sort of way, we find ourselves imagining the next developmental stage of our lives. What will we do? Will we work part-time? How about ushering some evenings at theatres? Will we be able to travel as much as we want? Oh, and how will our financial resources hold out?
The proprietors over at the Inside Aging Parents blog, and especially Bill Shanks, are writing some interesting posts about the beginning of retirement and the necessary decision-making, and their thoughts address many of my questions. If you, too, are beginning to think about this late-in-life developmental stage, I encourage you to head on over there and check out Bill’s posts.
Becoming A Grown-up Child…
One day in April 2007 my husband and I were the adult kids in our families — we are the only adult children
— and the next day we became what we laughingly call “real grown-ups,” helping first one, then two, and increasingly all three of our parents. It’s time to give back, and we do so willingly and happily. However the process is not easy, and it is not free from anxiety and tension. Check out the As Our Parents Age About page to learn more about the mission of this blog.
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As Our Parents Age by Marti Weston is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License.
Based on work at AsOurParentsAge.wordpress.com and AsOurParentsAge.net
Permissions beyond the scope of this license may be available by emailing As Our Parents Age. To learn more about this blog go to the AsYourParentsAge About page.
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