Monthly Archives: December 2010

Maryland’s first Eden Alternative-certified nursing home, Levindale Hebrew Geriatric Center and Hospital in Baltimore, ended 2010 by re-earning its Eden certification in December, 10 years after first joining the movement. What does that mean? Newswise and Lifebridge Health report: Levindale Hebrew Geriatric Center and Hospital earned re-certification as an Eden Alternative center in December 2010. Levindale [...]

The post-war generation will begin turning 65 in January at the rate of 10,000 per day.  Those are big numbers, and the number crunchers are having a hay day predicting societal, entitlement and financial disasters of epic proportions tied to aging boomers. As a former journalist I’m somewhat skeptical of news stories based purely on [...]

ChangingAging.org Top Stories Dec. 16 to Dec. 23 Health Policy Deadly Medicine This is not going to end well for any of us. Although older people have long been accustomed to the fact that no substantial testing on older people is done prior to the FDA’s approval of a new drug, the offshoring of all pre-approval [...]

The Economist explains why, beyond middle age, people get happier as they get older: ASK people how they feel about getting older, and they will probably reply in the same vein as Maurice Chevalier: “Old age isn’t so bad when you consider the alternative.” Stiffening joints, weakening muscles, fading eyesight and the clouding of memory, [...]

Al Power tackles some critical questions from a reader regarding the care her mother, who has Alzheimer’s, is receiving at an Eden registered facility. While neither Al nor Dr. Bill Thomas (who the comments are also directed at) can respond to the specifics of a medical situation they are not personally involved in, Al responds [...]

If you have a family member in a nursing home or long term care facility and you don’t know what a long term care ombudsman is, you should definitely check out this post at The Consumer Boomer: A Long Term Care Ombudsman is, in the plainest definition, a representative to elderly folks in nursing homes [...]

McKnight’s Long Term Care News reports on a new study showing that putting a patient’s best interest before the interest’s of the doctor is the best policy for everyone: When healthcare providers tell patients about medical errors that happened under their care, the patient is twice as likely to recommend that provider to someone else [...]

Via McKnight’s Long Term Care News, this report should come as no surprise to ChangingAging readers: Nursing homes’ use of risky antipsychotic medications is far too common, according to a new report from Consumer Reports. The report’s authors analyzed numerous studies and determined that the use of antipsychotics to treat aggression, agitation or hallucinations in [...]

ChangingAging.org Top Stories Dec. 9 to Dec. 16 RealCareNow Live on RealCareNowTV: Measuring Person-Centered Care Join us live at 10:30 a.m. on Monday, Dec. 20, when Dr. Bill Thomas will interview the co-author of a recent study examining the effectiveness of patient-centered approaches to Dementia care for older adults. Researcher David Edvardsson, PhD, of the University [...]

Join us live at 10:30 a.m. on Monday, Dec. 20, (Live broadcasts subject to change — stay tuned) when Dr. Bill Thomas will interview the co-author of a recent study examining the effectiveness of patient-centered approaches to Dementia care for older adults on RealCareNowTV at PickerReport.org. The study by David Edvardsson, PhD, of the University of [...]