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Gerontologists Seek Longevity Prescription
Experts in gerontology, exercise and nutrition have reached an agreement on how diet, dietary supplements, exercise and other interventions such as hormone replacement therapy, contribute to better health and longevity. These lifestyle factors are important issues in longevity research because non-lifestyle (genetic) factors control only one-third of the normal aging process.
The problem with lifestyle recommendations is that there are too many conflicting and often unsubstantiated claims made by the makers of lifestyle remedies. Here's how the experts sorted out the truth in order to guide consumers toward more reality-based, anti-aging behavior.
Since muscle atrophy erodes 30 to 40 percent of muscle mass between the ages of 30 and 70, the experts recommend walking four miles a day, five days a week. Also, the greater your muscle mass, the more your body burns calories. So scientists recommend working out with light weights that involve the muscles of the arms, legs, and trunk.
Each task for a specific muscle group should be performed 10 times at about 80% of a maximum effort and then repeated three times with rests in between. Best time to workout? Late afternoon. Early morning can be risky for those with heart trouble. Late at night can interfere with your sleep. A healthy diet helps reduce the risk of age-related diseases such as cancer, cardiovascular disease, type II diabetes, and osteoporosis.
As a result, most of the experts agreed that eating at least five servings of fresh fruits and vegetables daily is a good idea. The fresh produce is preferable to taking dietary supplements. But, if you can't get fresh produce, then vitamin supplements are second best. Vitamins B6, B12, C, D, calcium, and folic acid are especially important to older adults.
Hormone replacement is also a much talked about supplement these days. The experts believe that while hormone levels decrease with age, it may not always be beneficial to increase the levels to those of younger individuals. Doing so would require costly assessment and surveillance.
The scientists also recommend regular sun exposure to maintain adequate levels of vitamin D and the sleep-wake cycle, but to avoid excessive exposure to reduce the risk of skin cancer. One children's aspirin daily (81 mg) was also believed to reduce the risk of myocardial infarction and stroke.
Finally, stress reduction and relaxation is recommended through such activities as yoga or Tai Chi. Robert Butler, M.D., and President of the International Longevity Center organized the meeting that produced the prescription for longevity. Butler is a Pulitzer Prize winner and Professor of Geriatrics at the Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York.
Says Butler, "With so much hype for products promising the eternal fountain of youth and many contradictory research findings, people are confused about what they can do to ensure good health. We wanted to provide some clarification, after examining the data and reaching an agreement on what's been proven to be effective for promoting long life ... a life free from disease and disability." The International Longevity Center is a non-profit, non-partisan organization devoted solely to the study of population aging and its impact on society.
AgeVenture News Service, www.demko.com
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Brain Chemical Called Death Messenger
Researchers at Saint Louis University School of Medicine (SLU) have written the final chapter in a story of how certain nerve cells may come to an untimely demise. In the process of learning how the brain chemical, Dopegal, is toxic in people with degenerative diseases such as Alzheimer's and Parkinson's disease, they have learned more specifically how Dopegal causes the death of brain cells.
Along with collaborators at Washington University and Cornell University, SLU researchers examined the way in which the neurotransmitter norepinephrine converts to Dopegal and how it is transformed from a life-giving messenger to a cell death-messenger, setting the cell up for suicide. Dopegal relays a deadly message to the cell's source of energy called the mitochondria, that unleashes a cascade of events.
During this process call "apoptosis", Dopegal incites the mitochondria into discharging the proteins that initiate the chain reaction leading to cell death. As a result, the mitochondria that ordinarily sustain the life of the cell are converted to cell suicide machines. "We now know the complete story of how cell death occurs in a group of nerve cells in Alzheimer's disease," says Dr. William J. Burke, professor of neurology.
"Dopegal generates free radicals which are highly reactive chemicals that open a pore in the mitochondria releasing proteins that trigger cell death." Nerve cells in the part of the brain called the locus ceruleus are responsible for brain functions of attention, memory, mood, and sleep. When these nerve cells undergo apoptosis and die, these functions are lost. This accounts for the functional changes in people with diseases such as Alzheimer's and Parkinson's.
AgeVenture News Service, www.demko.com
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Women Continue Caregiver Tradition
The myth of the Super Woman isn't a myth at all, according to a recent study reported in The Gerontologist. Super Woman is alive, well, and still caregiving ... despite fears that employment of women outside the home would severely affect their traditional caregiving role. A team of researchers led by Pamela Doty, PhD, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, found that the increase in female labor force participation is having less of an effect on the availability of informal eldercare than many experts had predicted.
That's more important than most Americans might think because the lion's share, 80-90%, of eldercare is provided by family members, not outside agencies. According to Dr. Doty and her colleagues, caregiving in the United States is still influenced by what has been termed the "ethics of care." American women, whether they are employed outside the home or not, continue to provide eldercare and/or find help from others in the informal network.
"Employed female primary caregivers compensate for the time constraints employment puts on their personal availability by accessing other sources of help, from paid helpers or from a combination of paid and secondary informal helpers." This strategy, Dr. Doty pointed out, appears "to be successful insofar as no significant differences emerged with respect to the total hours of care received by care recipients of employed and nonemployed female primary caregivers."
The strongest evidence that women’s "ethic of care" still hold sway even among employed women is that employed women caregivers provide high weekly amounts of care (average 18 hours a week). On average the care recipients received about 38 hours of help weekly from all sources of which about 29 hours were provided by the primary caregiver.
It is also true that when there is a conflict between work and caregiving, employed caregivers have to choose between cutting back their hours of work or accessing larger amounts of supplemental help. This juggling between careers and caregiving responsibility doesn’t come easy, but it seems that American women can and do manage to keep alive the tradition of caregiving. Source:Gerontological Society of America.
See these related articles in the AgeVenture archives.
MOMS the Word for Caregivers
Aging Workforce Spawns New Benefit
Roam'n Ain't No Holiday for Caregivers
AgeVenture News Service, www.demko.com
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Market Watch: Nursing Home Trends
No segment of the eldercare industry seems to be growing faster than long term nursing care. There are more frail elderly in need of these services. There are more nursing home facilities to serve them. And, the need for specialty services such as Alzheimer's and dementia care is rapidly increasing.
A survey by HHS' Agency for Health Care Policy and Research (AHCPR) shows nearly one in five
nursing homes offers care for residents with Alzheimer's disease or other special-need residents in
specialized units. Just over 19 percent of all nursing homes (3,240 facilities) have one or more special-needs nursing, with over half of these units reserved for residents with Alzheimer's disease
or related dementia.
Nearly 13 percent of nursing homes (2,130 homes) have units for residents with
Alzheimer's. The average Alzheimer's unit housed approximately 34 beds. Because of the dramatic growth in the number of Americans over age 75, the current nursing home population is more frail than before and requires more specialized care.
Almost half (47.7 percent) of all nursing home residents have some form of dementia. Recent growth patterns illustrate 15 to 20 percent annual increases in the number of such beds. The occupancy rate for nursing homes as a whole is roughly 89 percent.
The number of nursing homes has increased by 20 percent in
almost a decade and the number of nursing home beds has risen 19 percent. Most of the increase in
the number of nursing homes resulted from a rise in the number of for-profit nursing homes affiliated
with a chain (up 20 percent) and from the growth of nonprofit independent nursing homes (up 48
percent).
This comparison includes facilities certified by Medicaid and/or Medicare, or licensed by the state as nursing homes and providing 24-hour nursing care. The survey also found that:
- 65% of nursing homes operated for profit.
- 68% of these for-profit homes (45% of all nursing homes) are part of a chain.
- 83% of residents require help with 3 or more ADLs (bathing, eating, and using the toilet).
- Nonprofit nursing homes are more likely than for-profit homes to be affiliated with non-nursing units, such as personal care or independent living.
- nonprofit nursing homes are more likely to be hospital-based than for-profit nursing homes.
- Only 58% of nursing home residents had some type of advance directive, in the form of a living
will, do-not-resuscitate order, do-not-hospitalize order, or other directive with regard to feeding,
medication or treatment.
Look for continued growth, not only in long term nursing care, but also in the support industries that help these facilities operate in a professional, caring, and cost-effective manner. This includes personnel management and training, volunteer recruitment, long term care insurance, living wills, marketing and public relations, and more.
See these related articles in the AgeVenture archives.
Nursing Home Therapy Declared Excessive
Nursing Home Growth Swept Under RUG
Impact of Nursing Home Reform Act
Gender Gap in Nursing Home Expectations
AgeVenture News Service, www.demko.com
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New Retirement Age Won't Fix Social Security
Despite all the smoke and mirrors, the word is finally out that Social Security is doomed unless dramatic and immediate changes are undertaken. As a result, everyone and their grandmother seems to have a scheme to fix the ailing system.
Even though these schemes are wide-ranging, they do appear to have at least one thing in common, they don't seem to work. Here's the latest in the "Save Our Security" debate. It is a recommendation to delay the retirement age to 70 in an effort to strengthen the Social Security system. According to a University of Wyoming (UW) professor who has studied careers of older workers, it's not likely to succeed.
The National Commission on Retirement Policy (NCRP) has recommended extending the age to receive full social security benefits to age 70 by the year 2029. This was one recommendation to help save the Social Security system threatened with collapse because of the immense numbers of baby boomers who will be eligible for payments beginning within the next decade.
"Delaying retirement may be a reasonable solution from an actuarial viewpoint because it provides a longer time period over which to make contributions and it defers the date at which benefits must be paid," says Martin Greller, a professor in the UW College of Business. "But it makes an assumption not supported by facts. It disregards that half of the population is out of the workforce by age 58."
Greller points out that the age at which most people stop working is far younger than 65. Despite the recognition that people live longer, the passage of age discrimination laws and an increased national concern for the adequacy of post-retirement income sources, people still do not work any longer. If anything the trend has been toward earlier retirement.
"So a plan that encourages people to work an extra five years beyond age 65 isn't likely to be successful if more than half the workforce has left seven years before they reach age 65," he says. "Simply changing the social security laws without also doing things to encourage people to keep investing in their own careers and encouraging them to look towards a longer career will not keep people working at their maximum earning capacity through their 60s," says Greller.
AgeVenture News Service, www.demko.com
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