NPN benefitsBlog

Medicare Senior Risk Reduction Demonstration/ AoA

As part of U.S. Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Mike Leavitt's focus on prevention, HHS Assistant Secretary for Aging Josefina G. Carbonell has announced participation in a demonstration designed to help seniors stay healthy. Nine Aging and Disability Resource Center (ADRC) programs and an Administration on Aging (AoA) Older Americans Act Information and Referral (I&R) program will participate in the Medicare Senior Risk Reduction Demonstration.

The CMS Medicare Senior Risk Reduction Demonstration is designed to evaluate whether health promotion and disease prevention programs currently offered by national private insurers and employers can be delivered by the Medicare program to encourage beneficiaries to engage in healthy lifestyles and practices that can help them maintain and improve their health and reduce the need for health care services for preventable illnesses, injuries, or complications.

HHS Releases New Health Literacy Tool for Professionals Who Serve Older Adults

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services has told NPN this morning that the agency has released a new health literacy tool for people who serve older adults. The Quick Guide to Health Literacy and Older Adults is designed to provide useful strategies and suggestions to professionals who work with older adults to help bridge the communication gap between professionals and older adults.

In a national assessment of health literacy, only three percent of the older adults surveyed were found to be proficient in health literacy. Persons with limited health literacy have more adverse health outcomes including less frequent use of preventive services, higher hospitalization rates, and more emergency room visits. For older Americans, difficulties with health literacy can complicate already challenging health problems since as many as 80 percent of older Americans have at least one chronic disease.

Administration on Aging Posts Census Resource

The Administration on Aging (AoA) recently posted on its web site an Excel Workbook with the 2006 population estimates for the older population of each county in the US. The data was tabulated by AoA from the latest Census Bureau population estimates. Data on various age groups is presented.

Also, AoA recently launched its online AGing Integrated Database (AGID) system. With AGID, users may generate tables from four key AoA funded surveys and AoA program information systems as well as data on population characteristics from the Census Bureau,. The system allows users to produce customized tables in a step-by-step non-technical process and output the results in print or spreadsheet form. Users can also build customized state-level tables from multiple databases.

Do Older Workers Face Discrimination?

The Center for Retirement Research at Boston College has released a new Issue in Brief: Do Older Workers Face Discrimination? by Joanna N. Lahey

As the leading edge of the baby boom generation approaches 60, growing evidence suggests that many may want to work beyond traditional retirement ages. Longer work lives may be desirable for a combination of reasons, including financial need, robust health, and the desire to stay active, productive, and engaged. Americans will need to work longer, they are capable of working longer, and many say they wish to work longer. But will they be able to find work at later ages? This brief describes existing evidence on age discrimination and summarizes the results of a recent experiment that found that older job applicants are treated differently than younger applicants.

AARP Report Underscores Importance of Social Security for Aging Persons

AARP's second annual quality of life report card, The State of 50+ America 2005, examines the well-being of Americans ages 50 and older by analyzing 25 key indicators and tracking over time measurements on economic and health status, consumption/social/lifestyle, and independent living/long-term care.

The report which includes updated numbers showing why Social Security iis so important to aging people and shows an increased reliance on Social Security among other significant factors on their quality of life.

• Incomes of retirees are very low. More than half of households between the ages of 65 and 75 are living on less than $30,000 a year, and more than half of households over 75 are living on less than $20,000.

• Social Security is essential for the majority of retirees. It provides more than half the income of nearly 40 percent of households aged 65 to 75. Among households over 75 years old, 60 percent get the majority of their income from Social Security.

• Financial assets (mostly savings and mutual fund balances) of those over 65, in spite of being significantly higher than they were 10 years ago, remain very low. Nearly half of all households aged 65 to 75 have less than $50,000 in financial assets, and for those aged over 75, more than half have less than $40,000.

Aging and Future Trends in State Courts

As I was doing research on aging issues, I ran across an excellent series of articles from The National Center for State Courts (NCSC) in its report, Future Trends in State Courts 2004. The series looks at the way the large populations of aging Americans will impact and change our legal sytems dramatically. Some major issues will include, among other things:

• Increased probate, retirement and pension plan litigation.
• Increased emphasis on Americans With Disabilities Act compliance for the elderly.
• More traffic accidents involving the elderly will spur stricter restrictions for license renewals and changes in insurance practices.
• More identity theft and more of it by family members.
• Increased opportunities for fraud, abuse and crime by health care workers.

Sally Hurme, with the AARP, says the readiness of courts is "uneven" across the country and courts need to take a close look at their preparedness, because the numbers are coming whether they're prepared or not."

The report and other excellent informational materials can be found at online at the NCSC website.