Tag Archives for Senior Agenda

RI Gubernatorial Forum to ask, “what’s your Senior Agenda”

Published in RINewsToday on August 1, 2022

The Senior Agenda Coalition of RI (SACRI) has joined 17 organizations to bring you Rhode Island’s 2022 Gubernatorial Forum where candidates will talk about senior issues. The event is scheduled for Wednesday, August 3, 2022, at 10:00 a.m. at the East Providence High School’s new 900-seat capacity auditorium. Seating is limited to 450 people, leaving space for social distancing. Doors will open at 9:30 a.m. At press time, 350 seniors and aging advocates have registered to attend in person or virtually.    

“Senior issues must be viewed as a public policy priority because Rhode Island’s older population is growing dramatically,” says Bernard J. Beaudreau, SACRI’s Exec. Director, and one of the event’s organizers. According to Beaudreau, the U.S. Census Bureau estimates that the state’s total population of 65 years and older has grown by 20% from 152,183 in 2010 to 182,486 in 2020, adding 30,303 people in this age group. Rhode Island’s statewide planning projections also indicate that people sixty-five and older will grow to over 247,000 by 2030, an increase of 65,000 seniors over the 2020 census.

Gubernatorial candidates to delineate positions on key Senior Issues

“During the 90-minute forum, the gubernatorial candidates will share their positions on seven questions, hammered out by event cosponsors, as to how they would address a variety of policy issues impacting older Rhode Islanders,” says Beaudreau.  “Attendees will learn how candidates would rebuild and sustain a viable workforce for nursing homes and homecare providers. They will also be asked about their plans for Medicaid rebalancing and expansion to improve home and community-based care opportunities while ensuring the financial viability of nursing homes,” he says. 

Beaudreau says the forum also gives the gubernatorial candidates an opportunity to detail their strategies on how resources can be increased to significantly support healthy aging in the community. They will be asked by the moderator what type of assistance will be given to low-income seniors, and will they support a yearly cost-of-living adjustment to the state SSI payment and increase eligibility for the Medicare Savings Programs for seniors and people with disabilities to at least 185% FPL.

The attendees will also learn how the candidates, if elected governor, will ensure that an adequate amount of the $250 million in funding for affordable housing is allocated for seniors and how they will work to ensure equal access to high quality healthcare and information about available health care resources.

Finally, the gubernatorial candidates will be asked to make a pledge to address the needs of Rhode Island’s older population and provide the leadership and resources necessary to create and implement a Rhode Island Strategic Plan on Aging.

Recognizing the political clout of Seniors

“SACRI’s upcoming Gubernatorial Candidates’ Forum is important as older adults historically have high turnout in elections and the Forum provides an opportunity to hear the candidates’ views on issues important to seniors,” says Maureen Maigret, Chair of the Long-Term Care Coordinating Council’s Aging in Community Subcommittee. “The Forum should cause candidates to take a serious look at the state’s demographics, to note how the older population is growing, and to reflect on how government can best support older adults’ desire to remain healthy and living in the community and provide quality facility care when needed,” says Maigret.

“The Forum allows us to set forth policy priorities and hold whoever is elected accountable for addressing them. An example of this is when former Governor Raimondo was elected. She had been presented with priorities for restoring budget cuts to senior services such as Meals on Wheels and some of the cuts were restored in her budgets,” Maigret noted.

SACRI’s Beaudreau says that the senior vote will influence the outcome of the upcoming primary and mid-term. “Rhode Island seniors 60 years of age and older represent 34% of all registered voters and accounted for 42% of the vote in the 2020 general election. Rhode Island seniors have higher voter participation rates than the rest of the population,” says Beaudreau, this being 77% compared to 57% for voters under 60 years of age. “We have a powerful voice to be exercised to impact public policy,” he says.

Political pundit Wendy J. Schiller sees seniors as a crucial voting bloc in American politics. “On average, 72% of voters over the age of 65 turn out to vote in presidential elections, as compared to about 48.6% of voters under the age of 30. Seniors are consistent and typically well-informed voters on issues concerning Social Security and Medicare,” says Schiller, Royce Family Professor of Teaching Excellence in Political Science and Director of the Taubman Center on American Politics and Policy, Brown University. 

According to Schiller, in the past 3 elections, “seniors have split about 55-56% for the Republicans, and 45-46% for Democrats. Seniors have been viewed as more conservative (Sun City AZ, the Villages FL) but the data do not really bear that out as you can see. There is a tilt, but not a full lean toward the GOP; this midterm season might be different though. If the 22 midterm elections were held tomorrow, you might expect to see even a bigger swing toward GOP candidates than usual because of inflation alone. Inflation is just one area where there is a gap in issue concerns between older and younger voters. Older voters worry a great deal about inflation eating into their savings and pensions that are not adjusted for inflation while younger voters may be as concerned with climate change and abortion rights as much or even more than they are worried about inflation,” she says.  

Schiller says that seniors are like all other voters in that they are highly influenced by their political party affiliation, even in cases where the party proposes policies that run against their interests. “The GOP has proposed cutting Medicare ever since it was created, most recently under President Trump, but they are not careful to say that such cuts would not affect current recipients or even people aged 55 or over and the majority of seniors voted for Donald Trump in 2020. Democrats ran into some trouble with seniors when Bernie Sanders and others proposed Medicare for All because seniors thought it would dilute their own services through Medicare, and/or raise their premiums,” adds Schiller.      

Adds well-known Rhode Island Political Strategist, Rob Horowitz, “As a group, seniors vote more regularly than any other age group. In the 2020 presidential election, for example, more than 3-in-4 people eligible voters between the ages of 65 to 74 voted as compared to about 2-in-4 eligible voters between the ages of 18 to 24. Since Rhode Island has an older population, seniors are a key group in pretty much every state and local election.  Winning campaigns in Rhode Island and throughout the nation devote time and advertising dollars to reaching seniors.”

According to Bob Weiner, former chief of staff director of the House Select Committee on Aging under Florida Congressman Claude Pepper and former spokesman for both the Clinton and Bush White Houses, no one can forget the clout of older voters because they are the most motivated demographic group to vote. “They can’t be broken out by political parties as people expect,” observes Weiner, noting that it is a very close 50-50 split vote. “Older voters vote Democratic and Republican; the Democrats must do more to capture the senior vote.  It’s close. In 2020, while Joe Biden won the popular vote by 7 million, Donald Trump won the senior vote 52% to 47%. It’s not a matter of party. Seniors’ quality of life is not political,” he says.

“But on the issues, they will tear apart a candidate who doesn’t support Social Security, Medicare and the rights of seniors to have continued employment and privileges in society,” Weiner notes.

“So, anybody who thinks they can get away with some horrible position, such as cutting back Social Security or Medicare in five years or utilizing the myth that Social Security is in deficit crisis, they can’t  because it has a 2 trillion surplus resulting from Claude Pepper negotiations to keep the program fully solvent through 2034,” Weiner says, noting that it only needs a “little repair” to keep it going.    

“Anybody who thinks that they are going to use Social Security and seniors to fund other federal government operations is badly mistaken,” says Weiner. “When President Bush wanted to privatize Medicare and Social Security and made a campaign out of that he actually helped lose congressional seats in an off-year election,” said Weiner, warning political candidates to think twice when thinking about balancing the federal budget on the backs of the nation’s elderly. 

“Voting Gives You Power”

“In Rhode Island and across the country, the data clearly show that voters aged 50+ will be the deciders in the 2022 elections,” said AARP Rhode Island State Director Catherine Taylor. “We are working with dozens of advocacy volunteers who are fighting for voters 50+ to make their voices heard on the issues that matter – especially in Rhode Island where we are in the midst of a housing crisis, nursing homes are in jeopardy, the cost of long-term care is skyrocketing and where people want leaders who are committed to making local communities more livable.

“At the federal level, older voters want to know candidates’ positions on protecting and strengthening the Social Security benefits Americans have paid into and earned through years of hard work, protecting and improving Medicare benefits, lowering prescription drug prices, and supporting family caregivers who risk their careers and financial futures to care for parents, spouses, and other loved ones,” Taylor said.

“Voting gives you the power to decide what our future looks like,” she continued “But you have to be in the know to vote. AARP Rhode Island has collected the most up-to-date election information, including key dates and deadlines, to make sure that the voices of voters 50+ are heard. We are doing everything we can to make sure older Rhode Islanders are prepared to vote and know the safe and secure voting options included in the new, AARP Rhode Island-backed Let RI Vote Act. In mid-August, we will offer a Video Voter Guide posted along with all the latest election information at aarp.org/RIvotes,” Taylor said.

Co-sponsoring this event is a broad coalition of 18 service providers and advocates: 

A Community Together, Alzheimer’s Association of RI, Carelink, Community Partners Network of RI, Economic Progress Institute, Leading Age RI, NAACP Providence Branch, Ocean State Center for Independent Living, PACE, Progreso Latino, RI Assisted Living Association, RI Elder Info, RI Health Care Association, RI Organizing Project, RI Senior Centers Directors Association, SEIU Healthcare 1199, Senior Agenda Coalition of RI and Village Common of RI.

in the high school’s new 900-seat capacity auditorium. 

To read AARP web blog articles discussing the impact of senior voters at the polls, go to: 

www.aarp.org/politics-society/government-elections/info-2022/older-voters-midterm-issues.html

www.aarp.org/content/dam/aarp/research/surveys_statistics/politics/2022/aarp-targeted-congressional-districts-survey-voters-18-older.doi.10.26419-2Fres.00550.033.pdf

https://press.aarp.org/2022-4-6-Women-Voters-Age-50-Over-Will-Decide-Balance-Power-Next-Election

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Questions Raised About the State’s New Independent Provider Program

Published in the Woonsocket Call on July 15, 2018

In the waning days of the 2018 legislative session, the Rhode Island General Assembly passed legislation (S 2734 Sub A, H 7803 Sub A) that establishes in the Ocean State the “Independent Provider” (IP) model of at-home care, which allows consumers to hire and manage caregivers of their own choice while the state takes on certain responsibilities, such as setting caregivers’ wages, qualification standards and hours. With Gov. Gina M. Raimondo’s signature, the legislation became law on June 29th.

The enacted legislation is backed by the Rhode Island Campaign for Home Care Independence and Choice, a coalition that includes the Senior Agenda Coalition, RI Working Families Party, RI Organizing Project, District 1199 SEIU New England, RI AFL-CIO, Economic Progress Institute and the RI Chapter of the National Organization of Women (NOW). But, although on the losing side of the legislative debate the Rhode Island Partnership for Home Care continues to express its concern about the impact on the delivery by IPs to seniors and persons with disability.

Overwhelming Support on Smith Hill

The health care legislation, sponsored by Senate Majority Whip Maryellen Goodwin (D-Providence) and Rep. Christopher R. Blazejewski (D-Providence), easily passed both the House and Senate Chambers. The Senate Committee on Labor unanimously passed the measure by a 9-0 vote. By a count of 33-0, the legislation easily passed on the Senate floor. Meanwhile, in the other chamber, the House Committee of Finance put its stamp of approval on the measure by a vote of 13-0, with the legislation ultimately passing of the House floor by a vote of 60-11. But, because the House amended the bill (in committee and on the floor), it had to come back to the Senate for consideration again. The Senate vote on the revised legislation was 28-3.

In a statement announcing the new law, Goodwin and Blazejewski, say “By increasing both availability and quality of at-home care options, the new law’s ultimate goal is to move Rhode Island toward greater use of care in the community rather than in nursing facilities, since at-home care is both more comfortable and satisfying for consumers and less expensive than nursing facilities.”

“Presently, Rhode Island ranks 42nd in the nation in terms of investment in home care. Ninety percent of older Americans prefer home care. Not only is it more comfortable for seniors, it’s more cost-effective, as we’ve seen in states like Massachusetts. High-quality home care is what people want, and it saves money. I’m proud to support this effort to help make excellent home care available to more Rhode Islanders,” said Goodwin.

Adds, Blazejewski, “There is little question that people prefer to stay in their homes as long as possible. Particularly now, as the over-65 population in our state is rapidly expanding, Rhode Island must shift more of our long-term care resources toward supporting home care. Our legislation will help provide more options for home-based services, enhance access to them and establish standards that assure high-quality care.”

Hiring, Finding and Managing a Caregiver

Currently around 77 percent of Medicaid funding for long-term services and supports goes to nursing facility care rather than community-based care. Those who use community-based care generally go through agencies or find, hire and manage a caregiver on their own. This bill would create a third option.

Under the Independent Provider model, which has been in place in Massachusetts since 2008, consumers would still be the direct employer who determines when to hire or fire an employee, but the state would take on responsibilities for maintaining a registry of qualified caregivers, and would set parameters such as rates, qualifications and hours.

While the new law stipulates that they are not employees of the state, it would give home care workers the right to collectively bargain with the state over those parameters. Allowing them to organize would ensure that this otherwise dispersed workforce has a unified voice and a seat at the table to tackle the issues facing Rhode Island’s long term services and supports system, said the sponsors.

Consumers in states with independent provider models report higher levels of client satisfaction and autonomy, received more stable worker matches, improved medical outcomes, and reduced unmet need with agencies delivering fewer hours of care relative to the needs of the consumer.

In testimony supporting the health care legislation, Director Charles J. Fogarty, of Rhode Island’s Division of Elderly Affairs (DEA), told lawmakers that the health care legislation supports two goals of DEA, first it would enable elderly and disabled Rhode Islanders who are medically able to stay at home and second, it would address Rhode Island’s direct service provider workforce shortage.

Fogarty said it’s critical for older adults and people with disabilities to have access to the quality of care that is right for them. “In some cases, care from an independent provider they know and trust will best meet their needs to remain independent. In other cases, a home care agency will be the right fit. And for some, particularly those with complex medical needs, our quality nursing homes are the right option,” he said.

When quizzed asked about The Rhode Island Health Care Association’s position, Virginia Burke, President and CEO, recognized the value of home care in the state’s long-term care continuum but stressed that residents in the state’s nursing facilities “are too sick or impaired to mange at home.” She said, “Our only concern with this proposal is the suggestion that it could drain Medicaid funding from the frailest and most vulnerable among our elders in order to pay for a new Medicaid service. Surely our elders deserve good quality and compassionate care in all settings.”

Calling for More Education, State Oversight of IPs

While most who testified before the Senate and House panel hearings came to tout the benefits of bringing IP caregivers into the homes of older Rhode Islanders and persons with disabilities, Nicholas A. Oliver, Executive Director of the Rhode Island Partnership for Home Care, sees problems down the road and calls the new policy “duplicative and costly.”

In written testimony, if the legislation is passed Oliver warns that Rhode Island will be authorizing untrained and unsupervised paraprofessionals to deliver healthcare to the state’s most frail seniors without Department of Health oversight, without adherence to national accreditation standards for personal care attendant service delivery and without protections against fraud, waste and abuse.

Furthermore, his testimony expressed concern over the lack of oversight as to the quality of care provided by IPs to their older or disabled clients. Although the legislation called for supervision from the Director of Human Services (DHS), this state agency does not have the mandated legislative authority to investigate IPs to ensure that patient safety is met and the recipients of care are protected against harm in their homes. Nor does it require daily supervision for adherence to the patient’s authorized plan of care, he says, noting that is a requirement for licensed home health and hospice agencies.

Oliver observes that the legislation does not require IPs to receive the same level of intensive training that Certified Nursing Assistances (CNAs) receive from their home health care and hospice agencies. While the state requires all CNAs to complete 120 hours of initial training, pass a written and practical examination, become licensed by the Department of Health and maintain a license by completing a minimum of 12 hours of in-service training annually, the legislation only requires IPs to take three hours of generalized training and no continuing in-service training is required.

CNAs deliver the same personal care attendant services as the IPs but have a specific scope of practices that they must follow as regulated by the Department of Health and their licensure board while IPs do not have these requirements, says Oliver.

Finally, Oliver says that “to ensure quality of care [provided by home care and hospice agencies], CNAs are supervised by a registered nurse (RN) that is actively involved in the field and who is available to respond to both the patient’s and the CNA’s needs on-demand to reduce risk of patient injury, harm or declining health status and to reduce risk of CNA injury, harm or improper delivery of personal care.” IPs do not have this supervision., he says.

Safe guards are put in place by home health and hospice agencies to ensure the safety of patient and direct care staff, says Oliver, noting that these agencies are nationally accredited by The Joint Commission, the Community Health Accreditation Program (CHAP) or the Accreditation Commission for Health Care (ACHC) in partnership with the Department of Health for compliance of state and federal rules and regulations, as well as national clinical standards for personal care attendant service delivery.

With the Rhode Island General Assembly bringing IPs into the state’s health care delivery system, the state’s Executive Office of Health and Human Services, granted authority by the legislation to develop the program, might just consider establishing a Task Force of experts to closely monitor the progress of the new IP program’s implementation to ensure that quality of care is being provided and to make suggestions for legislative fixes next year if operational problems are identified. Unanticipated consequences of implementing new rules and regulations do happen and every effort should be state policy makers that this does will not happen in Rhode Island with the creation of the new IP program.

To watch Oliver talk about the Rhode Island Partnership for Home Care’s opposition to the enactment of IP legislation that would increase state involvement in the home care sector, go to http://m.golocalprov.com/live/nicholas-oliver.

Report: Alzheimer’s Poses Greater Risk for Older Women than Men

Published in Pawtucket Times, May 11, 2014

According to the Alzheimer’s Association 2014 Alzheimer’s disease Facts and Figures report released last Month, a woman’s estimated lifetime risk of developing Alzheimer’s at age 65 is 1 in 6, compared with nearly 1 in 11 for a man. As real a concern as breast cancer is to women’s health, women age 60 and over are about twice as likely to develop Alzheimer’s over the rest of their lives as they are to develop breast cancer, says the this years’ report.

The Facts and Figures report, an official report of the Alzheimer’s Association, the world’s leading voluntary health organization in Alzheimer’s care, support and research, is a comprehensive compilation of national statistics and information on Alzheimer’s disease and related dementias. The 75 page report conveys the impact of Alzheimer’s on individuals, families, government and the nation’s health care system. Since its 2007 inaugural release, the detailed report has become the most cited source covering the broad spectrum of Alzheimer’s issues.

“Through our role in the development of The Shriver Report: A Woman’s Nation Takes on Alzheimer’s in 2010, in conjunction with Maria Shriver, we know that women are the epicenter of Alzheimer’s disease, representing majority of both people with the disease and Alzheimer’s caregivers. The recently released Alzheimer’s Association Facts and Figures examines the impact of this unbalanced burden,” said Angela Geiger, chief strategy officer of the Alzheimer’s Association. “Well-deserved investments in breast cancer and other leading causes of death such as heart disease, stroke and HIV/AIDS have resulted in substantial decreases in death. Geiger calls for comparable investments in research to reach the same levels of successfully preventing and treating Alzheimer’s as the other leading causes of death.

Adding to women’s Alzheimer’s burden, there are 2.5 times as many women as men providing intensive “on- duty” care 24 hours for someone living with Alzheimer’s disease, says the report, also noting that among caregivers who feel isolated, women are much more likely than men to link isolation with feeling depressed (17 percent of women verse. 2 percent of men).

Also noted in the 2014 Alzheimer’s’ Facts and Figures report released on March 19, 2014, the strain of caring for someone with Alzheimer’s is also felt in the nation’s workplace, too. Among caregivers who have been employed while they were also care giving, 20 percent of women verse. 3 percent of men went from working full-time to working part-time while acting as a caregiver. The report also noted that 18 percent of women versus. 11 percent of men took a leave of absence while 11 percent of women verses 5 percent of men gave up work entirely. Finally, 10 percent of women verse 5 percent of men lost job benefits.

Far Reaching Fiscal Human Impact of Alzheimer’s

Meanwhile the Alzheimer’s Association Facts and Figures report noted that there are more than 5 million Americans living with this devastating disorder, including 3.2 million women and 200,000 people under the age of 65 with younger-onset Alzheimer’s disease (see my May 9, 2013 Commentary). However, Alzheimer’s has far-reaching effects by impacting entire families. Also, it was reported that there are currently 15.5 million caregivers providing 17.7 billion hours of unpaid care throughout the nation, often severely impacting their own health. The physical and emotional impact of dementia care giving resulted in an estimated $9.3 billion in increased healthcare costs for Alzheimer’s caregivers in 2013.

The total national cost of caring for people with Alzheimer’s and other dementias is projected to reach $214 billion this year, says the 2014 Facts and Figures report, not including unpaid care giving by family and friends valued at more than $220 billion. In 2014, the cost to Medicare and Medicaid of caring for those with Alzheimer’s and other dementias will reach a combined $150 billion with Medicare spending nearly $1 in every $5 on people with Alzheimer’s or another dementia.

The Facts and Figures report predicts the cost numbers to soar as the baby boomers continue to enter the age of greatest risk for Alzheimer’s disease. Unless something is done to change the course of the devastating disorder, there could be as many as 16 million Americans living with Alzheimer’s in 2050, at a cost of $1.2 trillion (in current dollars) to the nation. This dramatic rise includes a 500 percent increase in combined Medicare and Medicaid spending and a 400 percent increase in out-of-pocket spending.

The country’s first-ever National Plan to Address Alzheimer’s disease has a goal of preventing and effectively treating Alzheimer’s disease by 2025. Ensuring strong implementation of the National Alzheimer’s Plan, including adequately funding Alzheimer’s research, is the best way to avoid these staggering human and financial tolls.

Lack of Understanding of the Alzheimer’s’ Disease

“Despite being the nation’s biggest health threat, Alzheimer’s disease is still largely misunderstood. Everyone with a brain — male or female, family history or not — is at risk for Alzheimer’s,” said Geiger. “Age is the greatest risk factor for Alzheimer’s, and America is aging. As a nation, we must band together to protect our greatest asset, our brains.”

In 2010, the Alzheimer’s Association in partnership with Maria Shriver and The Shriver Report conducted a groundbreaking poll with the goal of exploring the compelling connection between Alzheimer’s disease and women. Data from that poll were published in The Shriver Report: A Woman’s Nation Takes on Alzheimer’s, which also included essays and reflections that gave personal perspectives to the poll’s numbers. For the first time, that report revealed not only the striking impact of the disease on individual lives, but also its especially strong effects on women — women living with the disease, as well as women who are caregivers, relatives, friends and loved ones of those directly affected.

Realizing the impact Alzheimer’s has on women — and the impact women can have when they work together — the Alzheimer’s Association is launching a national initiative this spring highlighting the power of women in the fight against this disease. To join the movement, visit http://www.alz.org/mybrain.

Maureen Maigret, policy consultant for the Senior Agenda Coalition of Rhode Island and Coordinator of the Rhode Island Older Woman’s Policy Group, concurs with the findings of the Alzheimer’s disease Facts and Figures report. She calls for the education of elected officials on the facts about Alzheimer’s disease and its greater prevalence among women. “It is clearly a tragedy for the women effected with the disease, and can be devastating for their caregivers, mostly daughters, trying to keep them at home,” she says.

Maigret says that Alzheimer’s disease and other dementias at the state level have tremendous implications for this state’s budget. “Data show that in Rhode Island, about three-quarters of persons in nursing homes paid for by Medicaid are older women. An overwhelming number of them have some cognitive decline or dementia, she notes.

“We must do more to ensure that quality long-term care is available for persons with dementia and that robust caregiver support services are in place for the many families dealing with parents, spouses and other loved ones suffering from this disease,” says Maigret, stressing that government funding on research must also be greatly increased in the hopes of finding a cure or ways to prevent its onset.

Director Catherine Taylor, of the state’s Division of Elderly Affairs, believes that the Alzheimer’s’ Association’s released 2014 Facts and Figures report, about a woman’s lifetime risk of developing the devastating cognitive disorder verses breast cancer “really help us understand, in stark terms, what a public health crisis Alzheimer’s disease is, especially for women.”

Taylor notes that the Ocean State is in the implementation phase of its State Plan on Alzheimer’s disease and Related Dementias (see my November 13, 2013 commentary), where state officials are working to improve information, care and supports for every family that confronts Alzheimer’s disease. “The work will continue until there’s a cure,” she says.

“It’s important to note that new research findings also indicates that up to half of the cases of Alzheimer’s disease may be linked to risk factors “within our control,” states Taylor, adding that reducing the risk of developing Alzheimer’s disease may be a simple as eating a healthy diet, staying active, learning new skills, and maintaining maintain strong connections with family, friends and community.

For those concerned about their risk of developing Alzheimer’s disease, join Prevent AD, Rhode Island’s Alzheimer’s disease Prevention Registry. Prevent AD volunteers will learn about prevention studies for which they may be qualified to participate in, as well as the latest news on brain health. For more information, call (401) 444-0789.

The full text of the Alzheimer’s Association 2014 Facts and Figures can be viewed at http://www.alz.org/downloads/facts_figures_2014.pdf. The full report also appeared in the March 2014 issue of Alzheimer’s & Dementia: the Journal of the Alzheimer’s Association (Volume 10, Issue 2).

Herb Weiss, LRI ’12, is a Pawtucket-based writer who covers aging, health care and medical issues. He can be reached at hweissri@aol.com.