Articles
The Journal on Active Aging brings articles of value to professionals dedicated to older-adult quality of life. Content sweeps across the active-aging landscape to focus on education and practice. Find articles of interest by searching the article archives in three ways: Enter a keyword in the articles search bar; click on search by topic; or type a keyword or phrase in the general search bar at the top of the page.
Topic- Program profiles
EngAGE by The Garlands: a lifestyle program supporting healthier, vital aging
Barrington, Illinois, is a northwestern suburb of Chicago known for its country living—a place where “small town meets urban convenience,” according to The Garlands of Barrington website. Locally owned and operated by Barrington Venture LLC, The Garlands is home to more than 250 members in independent living, assisted living, memory support and skilled nursing residences. This continuing care retirement community, which opened in 2002, has been recognized for its design, construction and skilled nursing program, among other things. Last year, the community’s lifestyle initiative was also honored for its excellence with a 2009 ICAA Innovators Award.
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Art as Therapy: nurturing well-being and relationships for people with dementia by Teresa Amaral Beshwate, MPH, and Keith Kasin, MHA
In the book Beyond Forgetting, poet and essayist Holly J. Hughes describes her mother’s decline from Alzheimer’s disease as “a slow process of subtraction, as we lost her one brain cell, one synapse at a time.” Family and friends of those living with Alzheimer’s and other forms of dementia would likely agree. As a person with dementia slowly loses memory, personality traits, skills and expressive abilities, loved ones face the difficult task of adjusting to an ever-evolving state of “normal.” Relationships can begin to break down as the ability to converse about familiar topics and shared experiences fades away. To expand on Hughes’s concept, relationships are also subject to that slow process of subtraction.
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'Virtual' senior center connects older adults to community and family by Marilynn Larkin, MA
In the United States, the number of people ages 65 and over will be growing faster than the total population in every state by 2030—and 26 states will have doubled their older-adult population, according to the US Census Bureau. At the same time, the number of homebound elders—now at least two million—will likely rise significantly, a scenario almost certain to occur in other countries, too, as the world population ages. The result could be large numbers of older adults who are socially isolated, depressed, and gradually losing their independence.
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Kisco's 100 Ways to Wellness encourages residents to 'dare to make a change'
In North Carolina’s Piedmont Triad Region, three Kisco communities collaborated to promote “living well” in 2008 with the 100 Ways to Wellness challenge. The six-month program—developed by wellness directors Nicki Grudzinskas, Allison Pait and Leigh Grimes, of Heritage Woods, Abbotswood at Irving Park and Heritage Greens respectively—inspired participants to be more active, engaged and adventurous. Daring individuals to make a change, the program’s slogan reinforced the message that it’s never too late to explore and accomplish new things. Overall, the residents, family members and staff associates at the three Triad communities received the initiative so well that Kisco later rolled out the program at several other locations.
To learn more about 100 Ways to Wellness, the Journal on Active Aging® recently asked Grudzinskas, Pait and Grimes to tell us about their program, and how they developed and implemented it jointly in their communities.
JAA: Let’s first talk about wellness in Kisco communities. How do you define wellness?
LG: Our website defines wellness as “the combination of many factors that both strengthen and enhance the mind, body and spirit and involves the whole human experience encompassing the primary aspects of a healthy lifestyle: emotional, intellectual, physical, social, spiritual and vocational.” We believe that “our wellness programs … bring a new lifestyle perspective, an optimistic outlook, and a can-do attitude for both residents and associates.”
JAA: How would you describe the 100 Ways to Wellness initiative?
AP: Our 100 Ways to Wellness program was a list of 100 wellness tasks designed to inspire residents to step outside their comfort zones and engage in life in very meaningful ways. This wellness initiative was designed as an incentive program—something our three communities collaborate on annually. It was perhaps our most successful effort to date in terms of truly holistic wellness programming and addressing “The Art of Living Well.”
NG: The key programming element of 100 Ways was its focus on all six dimensions of wellness. We wanted this challenge to be much more holistic than a traditional physical activity incentive program. To that point, we hoped to reach a much greater audience.
JAA: How did you develop and implement the program in your three communities?
LG: The beginnings of 100 Ways to Wellness were a bit unorthodox. The idea sprang from the television show “My Name is Earl” and from the 2007 motion picture The Bucket List, which gave us the idea of creating a “wellness-specific bucket list.” We wanted a list of tasks that would challenge participants to do things that reflected our six-dimension philosophy of wellness, but also would, at times, push individuals out of their comfort zones. Our original list had more than 150 wellness tasks. Ultimately, we whittled it down to an even 100. A participant booklet was then designed that contained these tasks, and provided room for individuals to journal their thoughts and reflections as they completed each one.
Program implementation started with a kickoff party at a local park. The event, held the last Wednesday in May, took place in conjunction with National Senior Health and Fitness Day, and featured a wellness fair, a guest speaker, and a wonderful cookout lunch. Residents who came to the kickoff each received the booklet/journal, as well as a change purse screen-printed with the slogan “Dare to Make a Change.”
The 100 Ways to Wellness challenge continued for the remainder of the year. Each month we held a group program at one of our three communities to support residents in completing some of the wellness tasks. Transportation was provided so individuals from the other two communities could attend.
Program profiles
Engaging university aging research in a continuing care retirement community by Michael J. Logan, MHA, CASP
Alex Francis gets to know his research participants—and their spouses—better than most scientists would. So, while it could have been idle chat for a participant’s wife to mention that her husband was getting a new hearing aid, it raised a red flag for Francis.
Participants don’t often know how changes in their lives might affect Francis’s research outcomes. But for a scientist studying hearing and cognition, it could have been disastrous for a participant to change hearing aids in the middle of a study. Had Francis, like many scientists, kept his distance from his research participants, he may have never known about the new hearing aid and the way it would have affected his study.
Program profiles
Nurturing wellness in people with dementia and their caregivers by Marilynn Larkin, MA
When my mother progressed from “mild” to “moderate” cognitive impairment, my brother and I visited a number of facilities recommended by our geriatric caseworker. Several were just as we feared—large buildings with locked doors; residents sitting in wheelchairs next to each other, but not interacting. Others had nicer environments, but would only accept individuals who didn’t have “behavior problems.” We eventually chose a cottage-style community with standard activities such as sing-alongs and bingo—better, but somehow, I wished for more.
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