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Baby Boom's Sound & Fury, Signifies Nothing
Maybe we need to be more like Alfred E. Neuman, "What, me worry?". Sure, the nation's filling up to the brim with all those millions of baby boomers. Twice as many as today's senior citizen population. Just the thought of all those me-generation boomers crawling all over the planet makes you want to reach for the bug spray. Afterall, what's going to happen to the economy, social security, medicare, when the boomers retire. Well, say the experts, nothing is going to happen. Nothing much at all. Seems like all the alarmists might be wrong about the pending doom brought on by the baby boom.
The National Academy on an Aging Society (NAAS) has called into question all the gloom and doom predictions about the impending retirement of baby boomers producing some sort of inevitable national crisis. Sure, there COULD be a crisis, but there are many more possible scenarios based on a variety of factors. The growth rate of the economy. The rate of personal savings. The future health status of the elderly. The resourcefulness of senior citizens. NAAS' study of this issue was supported by The Commonwealth Fund, a New York City-based national foundation that sponsors indepdent research on health and social issues. The NAAS is a public policy institute that fosters critical thinking about the implications of an aging society.
At any rate, NAAS director Robert Friedland says the facts "should make policy makers wary of enacting major changes based solely on anxiety about projected increases in the number of elderly people". "The word we should be focusing on is challenge, not crisis". According to Friedland, the so-called "unprecedented" demographics aren't unprecedented. Rapid growth in the older population has happened before. And guess what? We're all still around. The economy couldn't be better. "We should analyze how society has adapted to demographic changes in the past as a guide to how we might adapt in the future."
The NAAS makes an interesting case for their "non-mainstream", "non-alarmist" perspective on the future of an Aging America. Here's a few NAAS points on this issue.
- Demographic change hasn't always spelled doom.
Yes, the nation's elderly population may double in the next 35 years. But, it has already doubled since 1960 without any devastating consequences.
- Aging America isn't what it used to be.
Today's elderly are healthier, wealthier, and better educated as a group than the elderly of any previous generation.
- Demography isn't an exact science.
No one knows for sure just how large the elderly population will be in the future, since trends in life expectancy, immigration, and other factors are difficult to predict. Depending on many of these trends, the U.S. Census Bureau has projected, there may be as few as 288 million Americans in the year 2040 or as many as 458 million. That's a difference of almost 60 percent.
All this leads to the proverbial "bottom line". Let's plan for the future. But those future plans need to be anchored in reality, not hysteria. Afterall, the Baby Boom Crisis theory is just one scenario. A scenario full of sound and fury, that at least for now, signifies nothing.
See related articles in the AgeVenture archives.
"Boomers Better Prepared for Menopause"
"Medicare's Future Busted By Boomers"
"Science Helps Boomers Battle Premature Aging"
"American Boomers to Inherit $10 Trillion
Aging? Boomers say "Hell no, we won't go"
AgeVenture News Service, www.demko.com
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Elder Pen Pals: Bad Boys' Good Deeds
Anyone who thinks that all convicts are all bad, is giving inmates a bad wrap. South Dakota's inmates are up to some good. In fact, the U.S. Administration on Aging has forwarded kudos to that state's governor for creating a highly innovative approach to serving elders who require home assistance. Specifically, the Affordable Senior Housing Project designs senior-friendly homes for elders and handicapped.
Here's how it works. South Dakota's program puts state prison inmates to work, learning valuable skills, while providing smaller, affordable, easy to maintain homes for seniors and persons with disabilities. The simplified home design and prison labor keeps the cost of these homes low.
Great idea, but not everyone who would like this service is qualified to receive it. The qualifications for this program include the following criteria.
- head of household or spouse must be age 62-plus or declare a disability.
- the house must be used as the home buyer's primary residence.
- no income restrictions are used to screen the applicants.
Eligible buyers, says the Administration on Aging, include elderly individuals, person's with a disability, public housing authorities, public nonprofits such as cities, economic development corporations and local chambers of commerce.
If you're curious about this creative project, or would like to see these special homes firsthand, you don't have to visit South Dakota. In fact, you don't even have to leave the chair that you're reading from right now. Just take an online virtual tour of one of the homes at the housing project's Internet website located at www.sdhda.org/tran.html
See related articles in the AgeVenture archives.
"Smart Home Technology for Senior Living"
This Money is "on the house"
"Help With Homework Helps Home Work Well"
AgeVenture News Service, www.demko.com
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New Beginning for End-of-Life Therapy
Patients with terminal illnesses reach a time when they are faced with a very difficult choice---whether to take part in experimental research or enter a hospice program. Whichever they ultimately choose, they lose the benefits of the alternative. With this in mind, the University of Michigan Health System's Comprehensive Cancer Center and Hospice of Michigan will lead a research study, along with investigators at St. John Health System and Providence Hospital, that aims to improve the quality of life of terminally ill patients while helping them live as long as possible.
The three-year study, called the Palliative Care Project, challenges the current model of medical care in which terminally ill patients must choose between continued medical treatment from conventional health care providers and the supportive benefits of hospice care. Patients in this new program will be enrolled in hospice at the beginning of their treatment, allowing them the benefits of both hospice care and cutting-edge medical therapy.
Under the current model of care, when terminally ill patients enter an experimental medical study or receive palliative treatment, they typically spend all but the last week or two of life receiving treatment. Then, when all life-prolonging options are exhausted, they are moved into hospice care. The move to hospice care, coming in the final days of the patient's life, often is accompanied by feelings of abandonment on the part of patients, families, and health care-givers. Conversely, under the present system, if patients choose hospice care early, they deny themselves the chance to actively fight the
disease, for example, with chemotherapy or radiation.
"Preliminary studies suggest that integrating hospice care with traditional treatment improves quality of life for terminally ill patients and may also be more cost-effective than the current system of care," says lead researcher Kenneth J. Pienta, M.D., professor of internal medicine and surgery in the U-M Health
System. "Under this program, you can enter hospice early in the treatment cycle and still receive medicines, such as chemotherapy, that will relieve symptoms and potentially help you live longer."
Medicare and most insurance companies generally do not pay for hospice services until all life-prolonging options have been exhausted or refused. It is hoped results of this new study can provide valuable data to regional and national health care planners about costs of merging life-prolonging medical care with hospice and palliative care. The study is funded, in part, by a three-year, $1.35-million grant from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation as part of a new national program called "Promoting Excellence in End of Life Care."
See related articles in the AgeVenture archives.
"End-of-Life Decisions Made In A Heart Beat"
"Heaven's Waiting Room Studies End-of-Life"
"Hospice Becoming Household Word"
AgeVenture News Service, www.demko.com
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More Docs Encounter Patient Depression
The Center for the Advancement of Health reports that most primary care physicians are confident in their ability to diagnose depression and endorse this role as part of their clinical responsibilities, according to a national survey of family physicians, general internists, and obstetrician-gynecologists. In addition, many are providing treatment "consistent with guidelines for high quality care," says John W. Williams, Jr., MD, of the South Texas Veterans Health Care System, San Antonio.
The failure to recognize and treat depression in primary care has been repeatedly criticized in scientific research. It is estimated that depression afflicts 15 percent or more of those who seek help from primary care physicians, compared to an estimated 2-6 percent in the general population. Also, depressed patients use health care services three times more often than non-depressed patients, leading to concerns that depression in many patients was going undetected. "Primary care physicians appear to be doing better in this area than the critics suggest," says Allen J. Dietrich, MD, of Dartmouth Medical School. The researchers recommend that physicians ask directly about suicidal feelings, and schedule follow-up visits within two weeks.
Among the 621 family physicians surveyed, 88 percent viewed depression treatment as part of the clinical role, compared with 73 percent of the 464 general internists and 41 percent of the 255 obstetrician-gynecologists questioned. Similarly, 83 percent of family physicians were mostly confident or very confident in their ability to treat depression; 64 percent of general internists, and 34 percent of obstetrician-gynecologists expressed the same degree of confidence.
Williams and colleagues have reported their findings in the January-February issue of the Archives of Family Medicine, a journal published by the American Medical Association. The research was supported by a grant from the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation.
See related articles in the AgeVenture archives.
"Health-related Depression Higher for Men"
"90% of Elder Depression Goes Untreated"
"Response to Female Depression is Depressing"
AgeVenture News Service, www.demko.com
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Lower Score Makes Hire Harder for Elders
Here's how to get and keep a job. Do the Write thing. Get literate. Unfortunately, elder workers are hardest hit by poor literacy rates. In fact, lower scores for these mature workers make elder hires harder. Then there are those who already have a job, but have low literacy, which spells risky business for both the worker and the nation's economy. It's hard to keep a job when you can't read directions, and it's hard for America to compete using illiterate workers in what is now a global marketplace.
The National Council on Aging (NCOA) has decided to advocate for the needs of the mature, illiterate workers. A "deeply disturbing" pattern of poor literacy rates among older workers spells trouble if not quickly and effectively addressed says NCOA researcher, Syllia Riggs Liroff. Speaking to a regional conference of workforce development officials, Liroff said a recent study found that nearly half of Americans over 60 functioned at the lowest level of literacy in dealing with written instructions, forms and documents. Fully one-third of the lowest scores of all those tested in the study conducted by the National Institute of Literacy were among persons over 65 years of age, she said.
"The little bit of help older workers are getting is completely disproportionate compared to what is needed," says Liroff. For example, the new Workforce Investment Act has no provision for literacy training of older workers in earlier versions of the bill. "Incidents like this tell us there is poor recognition that Americans over 60 are still part of the job market -- and it tells us there is little recognition of their need for literacy training," she said. Liroff is calling for the provision of adequate literacy training to older job-seekers.
Efforts to keep mature Americans working is a great idea. One of the perils of the nation's social welfare policy is that it encourages retirement, even early retirement. That hurts both the worker and the nation. It wasn't too long ago that the American Medical Association referred to enforced idlement, like retirement, as a health hazard. Besides, the growing numbers of senior citizens, and their improving health status (thanks to modern medicine) makes it irrational to banish such an enormous human resource from our workforce. And ignoring the literacy problems of mature workers is defacto banishment.
See related articles in the AgeVenture archives.
"Functional Illiteracy Linked to Hospitalization"
"Retirees Wrestle Wrongs of Retirement Rites "
"Students Advised to Plan for Retirement Career"
AgeVenture News Service, www.demko.com
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