When older folks say this, most of us think, “That’s an old wives’ tale.” Well many experts who have studied the weather and how it affects our health are saying, “Not so fast.” What they’re finding is that weather, especially when it’s changing, does have an effect on how we feel and on many of […]

My memories of childhood summers seem almost magical in my mind. There were the cousins visiting, the parades on Main Street, and who could forget the food? Butter dripping off of fresh-picked corn on the cob, blackberry cobblers with the berries hand-picked by my mama and oh, the ultimate — hand-churned homemade ice cream! Homemade […]

The world’s population is aging rapidly. By 2050, the global population of people who have reached the age of 60 will be twice as high as that demographic’s population in 2019. In 2020, the number of people over the age of 60 exceeded the number of children younger than age 5 for the first time. […]

What are your very first memories of life? What do you recall when life was full of firsts and everything was brand new? I don’t know how but somehow I do believe those early memories are uniquely important in our lives. How could they not be? We carry them around for a lifetime. I was […]

Enacted in 2017, Hawaii’s Kapuna Caregivers Act may be a model for other states that want to help unpaid family caregivers. The Hawaiian word kapuna has multiple meanings but is commonly used to describe an elder or grandparent. In some contexts, the word also means “ancestor” or “source” and implies that members of earlier generations […]

When people think of bullying behavior, most flash back to a more distant time and place, and to visions of mean kids they recall from the playground. But bullying is also becoming a burgeoning problem among those we thought were old enough to know better: seniors, especially those living in group residences — from independent […]

In many ways, it was like the prom you might remember fondly — or less than fondly — from your youth: an auditorium festooned with balloons and paper mache decorations, a huge bowl of punch, the coronation of a king and queen, and a band kicking out dance-friendly tunes while a roving photographer snapped the […]

Jessica Zitter, a palliative care physician and critical care specialist, well remembers the moment she knew she had to get off “the end of life conveyor belt”—which she describes as the automatic, unquestioning use of machines and procedures used to keep a patient functioning, despite the prognosis or the questionable quality of life it may […]