Have you ever spent the day in a city with such bad air pollution that when you blew your nose the mucus had a black tinge? Have you ever coughed as you breathed in diesel fumes from a passing bus and thought to yourself, “Well, that’s a year gone from my life”? Could it actually […]
Caregiving is committed to publishing a diversity of opinions. The opinions expressed in this op-ed article are the author’s own. Americans are living longer today, with more than 54 million people age 65 and older. With a fast-aging population, how are we, as a society, helping to ensure that older adults have access to a high […]Read More
More nursing homes are waiting longer for Covid-19 test results for residents and staffers, according to federal data, making the fight against record numbers of omicron cases even harder. The double whammy of slower turnaround times for lab-based PCR tests and a shortage of rapid antigen tests has strained facilities where quickly identifying infections is […]Read More
Sometimes the smallest room in the house — the bathroom — can cause the greatest risk. One in four people over age 65 falls each year, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Bathrooms are a prime place for injuries, with falls causing about 80% of bathroom injuries. “For seniors aging in […]Read More
Short-term care offers assistance and a taste of senior living Above photo: A class in the pool at Westminster Place in Evanston When 84-year-old Shirley Ratcliff recently moved from Missouri to Chicago, her health was precarious. She lives with pulmonary fibrosis, relies on oxygen, and was recovering from pneumonia. After staying for a few weeks with […]Read More
Start early for less stress when sorting through a lifetime of stuff When Nan and Evan Freund decided to move closer to their children in California, they chose a 1,500-square-foot home in a continuing care retirement community. It was a big change from their 3,000-square-foot Victorian rowhouse in Chicago’s Hyde Park neighborhood. “After almost 50 […]Read More
Pat Walker was feeling particularly low. A sister had just died, and after a huge fight with her daughter, she couldn’t get out of bed. For this active, engaged 74-year-old, that was unheard of. So she sought therapy, which she had done in the past, but this time it was with a geropsychologist, someone who […]Read More
We’ve all felt the tug of something tangible snapping us back to moments in our past, such as the whiff of our grandmother’s perfume on a stranger, which reminds us of her warm embrace, or the notes of a favorite song that instantly transport us to our teen years. For the more than 6 million […]Read More
Communities provide options when one spouse requires more care than the other Lynne Bugai’s parents, Bud and Joanne, were in their 80s and married for 63 years when her dad decided they could no longer safely stay in their Park Ridge home. Over the course of a decade, Bud had survived bypass surgery, a heart attack, […]Read More
Try these communication pointers to connect to loved ones with dementia When Peter Zollo’s mother passed away in December, relatives spoke at the Zoom funeral about the happiest years of her life — before she suffered from memory loss due to dementia. Yet, Zollo chose to talk about her final years, which were also happy — […]Read More
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