A great summary of the new Alzheimer’s guidelines is at WEB MD. The recently posted article, New Alzheimer’s Guidelines Stress Early Diagnosis by Daniel J. DeNoon, goes over some of the new diagnosis information recently agreed upon by National Institutes of Aging (NIA) and the Alzheimer’s Association expert panels. The complete guidelines were published in the Journal of … Continue reading
Filed under aging changes …
Aging Parents, Adult Children: Caregiving and Empathy
When you have senior parents who need increasing support, empathy is critical. You try hard, and not always with success, to understand what they are experiencing. That’s called empathy. The concept of empathy has received a bit of a bad rap the past year or two with politicians actually taking the time to deliver statements … Continue reading
Multitasking and the Aging Brain
Over the past 20 years multitasking has become a common 20th and 21st Century conversation for people of all ages. Technology, especially the many things we seem to do all at once with the help of our gadgets, makes us think that we are all pretty good multi-taskers. Unfortunately, research is showing we aren’t doing … Continue reading
Redesigned Medicare Caregiver Site: Eldercare Community Resource Locator
A Quick Review of Eldercare Resource Locator The Eldercare locater link at the bottom of the Medicare Caregiver home page connects to a page where users can search for a broad range of eldercare resources or for connections and contact information for local community organizations. Users can search by zip code or city or for information on a … Continue reading
The Good Caregiver: Rules of the Road for Adult Children
I have just read The Good Caregiver cover-to-cover. The recently published book, by Robert L. Kane, M.D., is an all-in-one user’s guide with thorough, indexed, and therefore easy-to-find information about every aspect of elderly parent caregiving. Though he is a world-renowned specialist on aging and long-term care (Read Dr. Kane’s faculty bio), and he produces lots of … Continue reading
Just Die Already???
Check out today’s post, No Need for Death Threats! over at Changing Aging, Dr. Bill Thomas’ blog. He snapped this picture of this magazine cover at the airport in Philadelphia. I am beginning to believe that the next 30 years will be generationally tough, not only for our parents but also for us, the adult children … Continue reading
Does Parental Longevity Predict How Long We Live?
Those of us with parents who are living long and rich lives tend to assume that we have inherited their genes and therefore possess the capacity to live at least almost as long. However, a recently published study in the Journal of Internal Medicine, published by the Karolinska Institute (a Swedish NIH), questions that assumption. … Continue reading
Senior Emergency Centers at Hospitals
If you have taken aging parents for a noisy, confusing, not to mention long, emergency visit, you will want to keep well-informed about hospitals that are developing facilities expressly tailored to seniors. Yesterday, March 14, 2011, The New York Times New Old Age Blog posted an article, Emergency Rooms Built With the Elderly in Mind. … Continue reading
Aging and Decision-Making
No matter how old we are, making decisions and choices can be more difficult when we are presented with lots of options. As we age, we may take more time to make decisions compared to our children or grandchildren, and the situation can become a source of frustration for family members. Read Why It Takes So … Continue reading
Is Your Senior Parent a Library Devotee?
Memories from the not-too-distant past … Early this week, on a tour of the Library of Congress (LOC), I took this picture of the pre-electronic era card catalog area. I also found these statistics posted by the LOC librarians on a nearby wall. Most of our parents know how to use card catalogs backwards and … Continue reading
Banishing the Myths of Aging
The University of Pittsburgh Institute on Aging has a superb website, filled with information and resources on aging and supplemented with links that can help people solve problems and better understand medical conditions. The site is easy for seniors, families, and caregivers to navigate. Many of the resources are Pennsylvania specific, however others, like the … Continue reading
Facebook Privacy Settings Guide from Techlicious
Check out the Techlicious Facebook Privacy Guide, posted by Josh Kirschner on February 8, 2011 over at the Techlicious website. Maintaining control over privacy settings is a required and critical technology task for each Facebook user. Since sharing information is one of Facebook’s primary missions, the company wants to collect and share as much personal … Continue reading
Seeking Better Things to Buy as We Age…
A must-read article, In A Graying Population, Business Opportunity, appeared in the February 5, 2011 New York Times. Reporter Natasha Singer describes her visit to the MIT Age Lab as well as her experience wearing the Age Gain Now Empathy System (listen to an NPR system about these special suits), and she writes about the need for … Continue reading
Aging, Respect, Caregiving, and Honor: How Many of Us Could Do This?
For Mr. Bronson, a Neighbor’s Kind Act Led to a New Family tells the story of a couple in the Washington, DC area, John O’Leary and Nadine Epstein, who became friends and shared a home with Mr. Bronson, a 90-year-old man who had lost his home. What began as a spontaneous offer of a bedroom 25 … Continue reading
Learning About Retinas: Aging Parents and Adult Children
You can also check out my other posts about eyes and retinas. After going through five cataract surgeries with four senior parents and listening to people fret about floaters in their eyes, I thought I knew a lot about middle age and senior eye problems. But now I know that floaters can lead to flashes which … Continue reading
Three-Part Series on the Rigors of Aging Parent Caregiving
This week I discovered a great three-part series about aging parent caregiving, written by an adult child and published in the Redondo Beach Patch. I recommend taking a few minutes to read this set of short articles. When Mom Gets Old by Vanessa Poster appeared on March 15 – 17, 2010, and describes Ms. Poster’s … Continue reading
An Alzheimer’s Statistic I Did Not Know
Writing in the October 27, 2010 New York Times, three prestigious AIDS advocates, including retired Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor, call for a “man-on-the-moon” effort, setting a goal to stop Alzheimer’s, by the year 2020. Justice O’Connor, writing on the op-ed page along with medicine Nobel Prize winner, Stanley Prusiner (read his Nobel Price acceptance speech), and … Continue reading
Aging Parents Aging Feet
Sometimes an interesting article from the past pops up on the radar with information that is just as relevant today as when it when it appeared a few years ago. Today I discovered an article about aging and foot health, published in January 2007, and I wish that I had read it when it originally came … Continue reading
The Unexpected Caregiver
Check out the radio program, The Unexpected Caregiver, broadcast on KYMN Radio in Northfield, Minnesota. Host Kari Berit and her guests discuss caregiving, communication, health, medical information, and other critical issues that arise when adult children help aging parents. I listened to the program with Connie Goldman, the program on the dangers of denying our … Continue reading
Green House Project Conference – Live Streaming
Information about the conference is from the Changing Aging website and more information is available there. Because of continuing interest in the Green House Homes movement, and after posting four Green House Homes pieces, on this blog, I am planning to listen in to these presentations, and you can, too. See the information below. Begin Section … Continue reading
As Our Parents Age So Do We 