Monthly Archives for July 2002

Seniors Must Educate Themselves to Push for Political Policy Reforms   

Published in the Pawtucket Times on July 22, 2002

Did you go to the Bristol 4th of July parade?

Or perhaps were you one of hundreds of people who gathered at Slater Mill Historic Site to hear U.S. Rep. Patrick Kennedy’s announce his bid for re-election.

If you attended one of these events or one of the hundreds of others scattered throughout the Ocean State, you probably ended up meeting gubernatorial, legislative, statewide or congressional candidates who were seeking high visibility with voters and potential votes from old friends and new acquaintances.

The clock is ticking.

With about seven weeks before the Sept. 10 primary, Rhode Island political candidates are scrambling to fill up their calendars with the dates of hundreds of “must-attend” events.

Political wisdom tells us that these candidates are more responsive to attending coffees, festivals and events that will attract older voters. This is because seniors as a group tend to get to the polls more often than other younger demographic groups. Years of research on voting trends bear this out.

According to the Bureau of the Census, in the 1996 presidential election, voter turnout among Americans 65 and older was 67 percent, only 10 percent lower than their registration rate of 77 percent. In that presidential election cycle, voter registration and turnout for Americans 50 and over was about the same as for Americans over age 65 (64.4 percent). Yet only 31 percent of voters between the ages of 18 and 20 cast a vote in the presidential election of 1996.

Can this trend take hold for the 2002 Rhode Island elections? You bet.

The question is – are federal and state policy makers prepared to confront the changes that will occur with an aging America?

In the next Congress, both Republican and Democratic leadership must work closely together to develop sound aging policy initiatives.

Federal lawmakers must quickly come to grips with how to assist seniors to pay for costly long-term care while ensuring quality services are provided.  They must continue their efforts to hammer out a bipartisan law to make pharmaceutical drugs more affordable and to keep both Medicare and Socially Security financially solvent.

At the state level, the Gray Panthers of Rhode Island working in collaboration with the Rhode Island Forum on Aging and the Rhode Island Minority Elder Task Force, move to educate senior voters about state and federal aging issues. Funded by the Rhode Island Foundation, the Senior Agenda/Election 2002 project will identify priority state and federal aging issues, solicit candidate positions through a questionnaire and hold four regional forums to further discuss positions.

Become an educated voter. Learn more about the aging issues of important to you by carefully reading the political candidate’s positions in the written materials to be made available to you by the Senior Agenda/Election 2002 project.

At coffees, festivals and political events that you attend before the September primary and up to the November election, tell any gubernatorial, statewide or legislative candidates you meet to make further reforms net year to the state’s pharmaceutical program (RIPAE). Tell them about the need for assisted living facilities for moderate and low-income seniors and affordable housing options for frail and low-income seniors.

With the backdrop of the November election, Rhode Island lawmakers and Congress must continue their efforts to develop and implement programs and services especially geared to an aging society.

Aging as a policy and political issue will ultimately have an impact on every generation from today’s seniors, their aging baby boomers children, and finally to their young grandchildren and great-grandchildren.

Being an educated voter, especially one who consistently votes, is likely to gain points with a political candidate and with those who ultimately are elected to office.

The Best Of…Seniors Can follow Steps to Avoid Heat-Related Illnesses

Published July 8., 2002, Pawtucket Times

On July 3rd, it was so hot you could fry an egg on the pavement outside of McCoy Stadium.

Although more than 10,500 fans had bought tickets to watch the PawSox game against the Ottawa Lynx, which concluded with a 45-minute fireworks display, only 8,300 fans showed up, according to Ken McGill, co-chair of teh Pawtucket Fireworks Committee.

There were even smaller crowds who set up chairs in the parking lots and on sidewalks in the surrounding neighborhoods around McCoy Stadium to watch the much-awaited fireworks display, McGill said.

But despite the searing heat that evening it was clear that some just like it hot.

As the PawSox game was winding down, Ray Ethier, 60, a former union electrician, chatted with his friend, George Panas, 59, of Spumoni’s Restaurant.

“I don’t mind the heat.  I just don’t like this humidity,” he candidly admitted.  However, Ethier acknowledged that the heat has slowed him down a bit, because “it’s too hot to play golf.”

Panas doesn’t mind the searing outside heat either, or even working in a hot kitchen.

“When people are sweating buckets in the kitchen, I feel as cool as a cucumber,” he said.

Fifty-seven-year old Stan Lachut, a retired Pawtucket school teacher, waited with his wife Beverly, for darkness and for the fireworks show to begin. Standing by the barbecue tent and surrounded by more than 200-plus guests of the Pawtucket Firework’s Committee, the Cumberland residents said the heat’s not a problem for him, either.

“Being outside in summer is a time you can spend with your family and friends,” he said, whereas “colder temperatures force people to stay inside buildings.”

On the other hand, not everybody like summer’s hot days

Ttemperatures in the mid-90s, combined with high humidity, can become uncomfortable and a serious health hazard for seniors.  And many are heeding the advice of experts gleaned from radio, television, and local newspaper articles about how to cope with the scorching summer heat.

Patricia A. Nolan, M.D.,  the state’s top health official, gave her advise on surviving Rhode Island’s current heat wave.

Seniors, small children and the mentally ill are the most susceptible to health problems from searing summer heat waves, said Nolan, who serves as the director of Rhode Island’s Department of health.  High temperatures can be especially dangerous to persons’ with cardiac and respiratory probems and to mentally ill patients taking psychotropic medications, she said.

She noted that psychotropic medications make it harder for an individual to cool down.

According to Noran, the early symptoms of heat-related illnesses include muscle cramps in the arms, hands, abdomen and legs.  Muscle cramps are a result of dehydration and salt loss, primary problems associated with heat stress.  Additionally, Nolan said that fainting in the heat is another early symptom

If someone faints because of the heat, take the person into a cool place and cool them off by using a wet, cool cloth, Nolan recommends.

“You want to sponge people down and fan them to reduce their body heat,” she says.

Heat exhaustion, or heat-stork, is a more serious problem related to dehydration caused from high temperatures Nolan stated.  “Feelings of complete exhaustion, confusion, nausea or vomiting are real danger signs,” she said, adding, “If this occurs, you must get the body temperature down by addition fluids through intravenous methods.”

To successfully beat the heat, seniors should cut back on outside physical activities and drink plenty of water, Nolan recommends.

While water is the best fluid to drink on a hot day, fruit juice can also be considered a viable substitute.

“Cooling off with a cold beer is not the best plan,” Nolan said, noting that alcohol coffee, tea and soda are loaded with caffeine, which can increase the changes of dehydration.

“Seniors who tend to be most vulnerable to heat are those who don’t have a way to get cool for a part of the day,” Nolan said.  “One of the reasons heat waves affect the elderly more than the general population is because seniors are isolated, can’t get to a cool place, don’t have air conditioning and are afraid to open their windows at night when it finally cools down.”

Nolan warned that with temperatures in the mid-90s, staying indoors in a really hot house or apartment is not the best thing for seniors to do.

“Go to an air-conditioned shopping mall, see a movie, visit a restaurant, or get yourself into an air-conditioned space,” she recommended.  “If you can do this for an hour on a really hot day, you can protect yourself from serious health-related problems.”

Sometimes seniors get into trouble during days with high temperatures because they just don’t realize the danger,” Nolan noted.

During these days, it becomes important to monitor elderly parents or older friends, she says.

“Call on them every day to make sure they are coping with the heat.  Take them out to a cool place, like a shopping mall, a library, or a restaurant to let them cool off.”

In Rhode Island, some seniors tend not to adjust their behaviors to the heat because it’s only going to be hot for a few days,” Nolan says.

However, adjustments are fairly easy to make, she noted, stating that not making them can be hazardous to their health, and perhaps even deadly.

Herb Weiss is a Pawtucket-based freelance writer who writes about aging, health care and medical issues. He can be reached at hweissri@aol.com.

Morgan Health Center receives Prominent Award

Published in Pawtucket Times on July 1, 2002

Patient abuse, financial exploitation, Medicaid fraud, and poor nursing care.

In many cases, these activities are often picked up by the print and electronic media across the state.

The nursing facility industry will tell you that “bad news can sell a lot of newspapers.” In many cases, stories about good patient care, a loving staff and facilities that deliver high standards of care do not even reach the pages of a newspaper talk show or nighttime newscast.

Here’s a story that hopefully will be picked up and reported by Rhode Island’s print and electronic media.

The Joint Commission on Accreditation of Health Care Organizations (JCAHO) has awarded Johnston-based Morgan Health Center with Accreditation by Full Standards of Compliance for providing quality long-term care and subacute services.

Nearly  2,300 nursing facilities across the nation are JCAHO accredited every three years, notes JACHO spokesperson Charlene Hill.

Hill says that only five percent of these facilities receive the survey’s highest designation, that is, Accreditation with Full Standards Compliance.

In the Ocean State, 19 facilities out of 96, have been JCAO-accredited Only Morgan Health Center and The Clipper Home in Westerly, have obtained JCAHO’s highest designation.

What does JCAHO accreditation really mean to the consumer”

“JCAHO standards, in many cases, exceed federal nursing facility requirements,” Lois Richard, administrator of Morgan Health Center, tells All About Seniors,

Here’s an example of the difference between federal regulatory requirements and JCAHO. Federal law does not require a nursing facility to implement a process to accredit members of its medical staff, she says. However, JCAHO accreditation requires that facilities determine if physicians have hospital privileges, validate that they care malpractice insurance, actually have a medical license and practice within the scope of their license.

Ricard added JCAHO also requires that registered nurses, licensed practical nurses and certified nursing assistants also be credentialed in what they do. “Their skills and techniques are monitored annually or whenever necessary,” she said.

According to JCAHO, its accreditation process is recognized nationwide as a symbol of quality that reflects an organization’s commitment to meeting certain performance standards.

JCAHO uses standards to conduct a survey every three years that is evaluative, consultative, and educational. The primary goal of this survey is to assist a facility to identify and correct potential problems and improve the safety and quality of care and services provided.

During the survey, information, is collected through  observation, interviews with residents and staff and document reviews. The survey measures the organization’s against objective, state-of-the-art standards contained in the Comprehensive Accreditation Manual for Long-Term Care.

Richard said her facility now enters its third accreditation cycle. The 120-bed skilled nursing facility sought its initial accreditation in 1996.

For Roberta Hawkins, state ombudsman and executive director of the Alliance for Better Long-Term Care, it is no surprise that Morgan Health Center was awarded JCAHO’s highest designation. Lois Richard is “personally vested in the facility,” Hawkins said. “It is more than just a 9-to-5 job, that’s what makes the difference,” she says.

The next survey is scheduled for 2005. Richard said to get another perfect scored, “you have to be doing what is expected of you every day.”

“As a JCAHO accredited facility, you’re consistently looking at what you do to identify the problems in order to respond proactively before they occur,” says Richard.

“You can’t let things fall through the cracks. If you do , things will start slipping,” she notes.

For their successful effort of reaching the highest level of JCAHO accreditation, Morgan Health Center, and its staff must be commended for their efforts. Positive stories about nursing facility care might even reduce the fear that seniors experience when they have to consider nursing facility care for their loved ones or for themselves.

Editors and news directors might believe that a negative story about poor care in nursing facilities might shed light on an issue that needs to be addressed by public officials.

While this is true, it is now time to give as much weight to stories that recognize the hard efforts of nursing facility staff who strive against incredible odds (from inadequate Medicaid reimbursement  to chronic staffing shortages) to provide higher standards of care.

The way I look at it, allocating more print space or air tie to recognize facilities providing quality of care is only-balanced journalism.