Updated June 2025 Many of the nation’s nursing homes deliver quality care to people who desperately need it. Still, some deliver care more capably than others. How do consumers evaluate the promises that nursing homes make to provide excellent care to their loved ones? With the best of intentions, the federal government instituted a rating […]
Updated June 2025 In January 2021, a committee of the House of Lords published a report about the state of healthy aging in the United Kingdom. Notwithstanding the report’s focus on the UK, an editorial in Great Britain’s leading medical journal, The Lancet, notes that the impediments to health aging identified in the report pose […]
Updated June 2025 While we often hear people say, “Age is just a number” or “You are only as old as you feel,” it is just as common to hear disparaging remarks about older people. The notion that seniors are “over the hill” doesn’t reflect the reality of post-retirement living. The age at which one […]
Many seniors are energetic and tech-savvy. Both of those qualities may be necessary to sign up for a COVID-19 vaccination. Unfortunately, seniors who do not have the stamina or skills to navigate online resources may be left behind. Supplies of COVID-19 vaccines are increasing, but distribution continues to be challenging. Shipping the refrigerated doses, supplying […]
Living in the same household as an aging parent is often the best way for an adult child to provide for the parent’s needs. About 14% of adults who live in someone else’s home are the parent of the head of household. That percentage doubled between 1995 and 2018. Multigenerational households have been increasing for […]
The COVID-19 pandemic has caused hardship to many in a variety of ways. Coping with the pandemic has been particularly difficult for families who, heeding the advice of experts, have minimized their in-person contact with elderly relatives who suffer from health conditions that make them particularly vulnerable to COVID-19. The rollout of promising vaccines might […]
The article below deals with the state of Social Security in 2021. Click for the outlook of Social Security for 2023 Congress will have a full agenda during the first year of the Biden presidency. Economic stimulus will be a priority, although the political parties have different ideas about the role government should play in […]
The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) recent gave emergency approval to a vaccine that Pfizer-BioNTech developed to prevent the novel coronavirus from causing COVID-19. Based on preliminary data supplied by Pfizer, the FDA concluded that the vaccine “may be effective in preventing COVID-19. The data also support that the known and potential benefits outweigh the […]
Health authorities discourage social gatherings as a way to slow the spread of the virus that is responsible for COVID-19. Large groups of people in workplaces and schools also increase viral transmission, as governments discovered when newly opened schools closed after witnessing a spike in new COVID-19 cases. In some settings, including nursing homes and […]
Healthy aging means maintaining the functional abilities that enable wellbeing. Functional abilities include the capacity to meet basic needs, to be mobile, to build and maintain relationships, to make decisions, and to feel like a contributing member of society. Factors that contribute to healthy aging include exercise, diet, healthcare, having regular contact with friends and […]