Free Workshop: Women's Health and Retirement Security

Below is a pre-conference workshop being offered for free to ESPO members at the GSA Annual Scientific Conference

Workshop: Women's Health and Retirement Security

Friday, November 21, 2008

1:30pm – 6:30pm (reception from 5:30pm – 6:30pm)

The Gaylord Resort and Conference Center (Room: National Harbor 6)

201 Waterfront Street

National Harbor, MD

We invite you to attend a workshop focusing on the health and economic well-being of older women, with particular emphasis on race and socioeconomic differences. How do women fare under current policies? What will be the consequences for women of proposed Social Security and Medicare reforms? And how can we adapt these programs to better meet women's needs?

The workshop will cover both health and income security. Panelists will address both the state of current research as well as a range of policy issues. The sessions will be followed by a moderated discussion period and a wine-and-cheese reception.

Distinguished panelists include: Pamela Herd, PhD (University of Wisconsin); Jacqueline Angel, PhD (University of Texas, Austin); Molly Carnes (University of Wisconsin, Madison); Dorothy Dunlop, PhD (Northwestern University); Marilyn Moon (American Institutes for Research); Janet Wells (The National Consumer Voice for Quality Long Term Care); Eliza Pavalko, PhD (University of Minnesota); Michael Tanner (CATO Institute); Madonna Harrington Meyer, PhD (Syracuse University); Karen Holden (University of Wisconsin, Madison); Melissa Hardy, PhD (Penn State); Carroll Estes, PhD (University of California at San Francisco); Melissa Faverault (Urban Institute); Virginia Reno (National Academy for Social Insurance); Richard Johnson (Urban Institute); Stuart Butler, PhD (Heritage Foundation); and Charlene Harrington, PhD (University of California at San Francisco).

There is no charge for attending, but RSVP is requested to: Sarah Frey at sfrey@agingsociety.org or call (202) 587-2843.

A wine-and-cheese reception will follow.

Yale Training Program in Geriatric Clinical Epidemiology and Aging-Related Research

Yale University offers a two- to three-year postdoctoral training program in Geriatric Clinical Epidemiology and Aging-Related Research, sponsored by the National Institute on Aging. The goal of the program is to provide highly qualified fellows (MDs or PhDs) with research skills in geriatric clinical epidemiology and an intensive research experience under the mentorship of experienced investigators in gerontology and geriatric medicine. Trainees will have access to resources and expertise through the Program on Aging/Claude D. Pepper Older Americans Independence Center, the Robert Wood Johnson Clinical Scholars Program, the Investigative Medicine Program, the School of Public Health, and the Geriatric Medicine Program.
Candidates who have a PhD should have completed their doctoral training in areas such as (but not limited to) gerontology, public health, epidemiology, biostatistics, psychology, or biology, and should be committed to an academic career in aging-related research. US citizenship or permanent residence is required.

Information can be found at:

http://info.med.yale.edu/intmed/geriatrics/training/index.html

Infrastructure for Our Elderly

As I took the bus home yesterday, I observed a concerning yet awesome event. An elderly women, who clearly had difficulty even walking without assistance, was being helped by a complete stranger up the steps of the bus and into a seat. When she got off the bus, another woman helped her down and then walked with her to her final destination a block away, acting as a stabilizer as she had a quite unsteady gait and would have likely fell trying to get there on her own. I was proud that I didn't even have the chance to offer my assistance. That people jumped up so ready to help. However, the clinician in me asks: why does this woman A) not have a walker or other assistive device, and B) why is this woman out on her own without assistance.

It is concerning that the woman did not have an assistive device, it could be due to any number of problems from her refusing to use it because of vanity to receiving inadequate medical care, to not having enough money to pay the 20% co-pay, to recent change in functional status. The real concern however is the safety of our elderly and the lack of infrastructure, even in elder friendly cities such as San Francisco where there is ample public transit, defined sidewalks and many willing and able citizens to help a stranger cross the street.

As our population ages over the next 20 years, how are we going to cope with the onslaught? How is society going to provide the necessary services in order to prevent large swaths of the elderly public from being institutionalized? When elderly lose their ability to drive or to walk to the supermarket, who will help them? Meels on wheels or variations thereof are not everywhere and even where they are, it only solves part of the problem. Personal assistive services are generally only available to the very poor who are eligible for Medicaid and the very affluent who can afford to pay exorbitant rates for personal care upwards of $250,000/year.

It seems to me that the current setup is going to require family to take the largest burden, whether through payments for long term care or through assisting aging relatives with ADLs and IADLs. While we can expect family to assist in taking care of their family relatives to some extent, we cannot expect that this will become their full time job in most cases. Beyond most families not having the financial capability to do this, by doing so they will also be pulling themselves out of the real economy, further aggravating problems with paying for Social Security as well as endangering the economy as a whole. While the current financial crisis may be the only thing on the political radar at the momment, the graying of our society has the potential to be a true economic and thus national security threat as it begins to effect the economy over the next 10-20 years.

So the question is, considering where our society is now, and the lack of political opportunity at the momment to forward an agenda examining how to care for and create an infrastructure for our aging population, what are the next steps towards moving forward with an agenda for this enormous problem?

What ideas do you have for improving the infrastructure for taking care of our aging population? What barriers exist? How do we pay for the investment in our elderly? How can we help our elderly to age in place instead of being institutionalized? These are all questions that need to be answered before moving forward with an agenda into the political realm. As emerging scholars, we will become the experts in these fields over the next few years. Thus, we should start thinking of answers now so that when an opportunity does occur for political change in these areas, we are ready!

I encourage all of you in your disparate fields to think about how our society is about to change, and in our love for the study and care of the elderly, how we can assist, whether on an individual level, a city/county level, a state level, or on the national level, as things will only change if our voices are heard loud and clear throughout the country!

Responsibility to our Elders

I started writing this blog from the Hall of Justice in San Francisco, where I have been called in for jury duty (although interrupted halfway through because I was empaneled). While frustration reigns because I (like you) have a lot of work to do and this feels like a waste of time, I am also reminded of my civic duty.

Civic duty take the shape of many forms, from serving our nation in the armed forces, to voting, to protesting unjust actions of individuals of government (I could go on and on). But what does this have to do with us a ESPO members?

PLENTY!!!

From ensuring our elderly home or institution bound population has the opportunity to vote to ensuring that our society provides the proper care and safety net, it is our job to act. As citizens involved with care of the elderly, to advocate for their rights and safety. This is why I implore you, regardless of your political leanings' to become involved in the policy process and make your voice heard for all those who can't.

A good first start, beyond educating yourself about the issues, would be to sign up for the closing session of the annual conference, where a show of numbers to the congressional staff on capitol hill may help them to sway momentum in favor of action over continued inaction on any number of issues, including neglect, social security and medicare reform, nursing home reform, home and community based services incentives, etc...

Other ideas:

work with your local institutionalized care setting to ensure that residents are able to vote;

write your congressperson or state legislative leaders regarding a particular issue up for consideration (often you will see policy alerts from the GSA when major issues are before congress);

or even consider becoming involved in a local or statewide advocacy group for the elderly, as they often lobby for passage of acts related to geriatric interests. For instance, the California Coalition for Compassionate Care successfully lobbied this year to make Physician Orders For Life Sustaining Treatment (POLST) forms a legally acceptable document in my state, which will hopefully lead to more successful handoffs and advance care planning, and lead to fewer unnecessary procedures and hospitalizations.

Whatever it is, I encourage you to become involved, because our system is not working in too many places, from the social to the medical aspects of elder care, and we need your voice to make the difference!

Finally, remember to vote! Most states now even allow early or absentee voting prior to election day, that way if you get stuck in a storm, or your car breaks down, you don't need to worry about it because you will have already voted. Once again, your individual vote does make a difference.

Bench to Bedside: Lag Time versus Publication

In this weekly blog post I’d like us to think about the dissemination of our science. Will the advent of new technologies, such as blogging, electronic and open access online journals, and web 2.0 interactive technologies (user-generated content, facebook, etc…) change the way we disseminate and evaluate our work and the works of others? Will it lead to a shorter lag time from bench to bedside from the current 5-20 years? Will it lead academia to change the age old dictum of publish or perish?

I recently read an article in The Economist that discussed all these issues and even pointed me to a blog that discusses peer reviewed science called Research Blogging. This is only for after the research has been published however, not the original dissemination of work (although it can provide some visibility of the work) However, in the end, the question is how does this new world of technology relate to the emerging scholar? If on the academic track, as an emerging scholar you likely do not have tenure, meaning a significantly smaller soap box to stand from and significantly greater risks to job security to worry about. Furthermore, you would likely be concerned that you cannot get your work out prior to having it accepted for publication because you would be concerned that someone else might then beat you to the publishing punch, thus diminishing how your work is accepted within the community.

In this situation, we end up having to put our self interest versus the interests of improving the science in our given field and the lives of the elderly we wish to improve, a sticky ethical dilemma. On the one hand, by waiting until we publish we are A) receiving peer review so that our science is seen as stronger, and B) without publications it is difficult to receive further funding to perform future research which could be of greater help to the scientific elderly community. On the other hand however, by A) releasing our results as we complete our research we have the opportunity to get the word out faster, and B) disseminating through blogs or other similar types of postings making it easier for the lay public to understand and utilize, as they are more likely to read an article on a blog that popped up on a search engine, that in a less scientific writing style such as a formal publication.

Currently, it can take over 2 years from the completion of research to publication, and even then the results might not be widely disseminated because of the lack of access to the journal. So, I ask you, how do we ensure that our research has an impact and is reported in a timely manner, while still completing all of the necessary requirements for receiving tenure? What type of balance needs to occur and how can we affect change to improve on the current lag time from bench to bedside? Please share your thoughts in the comments section below so that we can have a dialogue on this topic!

Welcome to our blog!

Welcome all to this first post of the Emerging Scholars and Professionals Organization! We are very excited to be opening up this new foray into technology and communication with the membership. We very much appreciate your feedback and ideas for topics on the blog.

We plan on blogging regularly regarding life in the world of ESPO members. We also have setup a twitter microblog (you can follow by clicking on "follow me on twitter" on the right hand side of this blog), and will use it extensively during the upcoming Gerontological Society of America Annual Scientific Conference in National Harbor Maryland to give updates on ESPO events and impressions and thoughts at the conference.

Also, if you have a chance, signup for our facebook group to receive further updates and to meet others in our scholarly community!

-Ab Brody, ESPO Technology Chair