March 5, 2024
(Wall Street Journal) – “I have no brothers or sisters to take turns with me,” says Lori, 49. Lori is an only child. The family type is becoming more common, with about 22% of women at the end of their … Read More
February 19, 2024
February 14, 2024
(Washington Post via MSN) – The vow is “til death do us part.” But for former Dutch prime minister Dries van Agt and his wife, Eugenie, the aim was to leave this life the same way they had spent the … Read More
February 7, 2024
(The Atlantic) – Already, seniors make up 26.6 percent of the people who have been prescribed these and other GLP-1 agonists, including Ozempic, since 2018, according to a report from Truveta, which draws data from a large network of health-care … Read More
January 23, 2024
(KFF Health News) – “An astonishing amount of smoke gets inside these facilities,” said Luke Montrose, an environmental toxicologist and researcher at Colorado State University. Data from monitors Montrose installed in four Idaho long-term care facilities in 2020 showed that … Read More
January 17, 2024
(Washington Post) – The chairman of the Senate Special Committee on Aging is launching a review of safety lapses in the assisted-living industry, saying an investigation by The Washington Post into the deaths of dementia-care residents who have wandered from … Read More
January 17, 2024
(Quartz) – Welcome to the concept of synthetic memories. They aren’t photographs. They’re visual representations of what we can remember. And, using futuristic-sounding technology that’s actually available in the present, they can help us piece together elements of our past. … Read More
January 9, 2024
(The Free Press) – When Casey Means’ mother was diagnosed in 2021 with stage 4 pancreatic cancer, she and her brother Calley were suddenly given a front-row seat to the American healthcare system. It was a world they already knew … Read More
January 5, 2024
(Associated Press) – The family of former U.S. Rep. Eddie Bernice Johnson said Thursday that the trailblazing Texas congresswoman, who died over the weekend at age 89, passed away after getting an infection and accused a Dallas rehabilitation facility of … Read More
January 4, 2024
(Wired) – Beyond physical comfort, my goal as their caregiver was to help them to feel like themselves, even as that self evolved. I vowed to help them live their remaining years with joy and meaning. That’s not so much … Read More
December 28, 2023
December 22, 2023
(Washington Post via MSN) – If VR companies are to be believed, this technology is a blessing for the young and old, making video conferences fun and concerts less crowded. Consumers, for their part, have been lukewarm so far — … Read More
December 22, 2023
(Businessweek) – A startup called Minicircle wants to reprogram human genes—and is enlisting biohacker Bryan Johnson as a human guinea pig in its unproven approach. (Read More)
December 18, 2023
(The Guardian) – Dozens of elderly people have died across the US in the last five years after walking away unchecked from assisted-living or supposedly secure dementia or memory care facilities, a national study has found, highlighting a lack of … Read More
December 12, 2023
(NPR) – Recently, I wrote about the dark side of CPR. Despite a common misperception that CPR can rescue almost anyone from the brink of death, most people that receive it don’t survive. Of those that do, many sustain devastating … Read More
December 4, 2023
(New York Times) – Frank Lee’s search for trustworthy home health aides — an experience that millions of American families face — has often been exhausting and infuriating, but he has persisted. He didn’t entirely trust the care his wife … Read More
December 1, 2023
(Axios) – Doctors specializing in care for older adults are increasingly in demand as the country ages — but America’s newer physicians aren’t that interested in geriatric medicine. Driving the news: Less than half of 348 post-residency fellowships for geriatric … Read More
November 30, 2023
(MIT Technology Review) – Money can’t buy happiness, but X Prize founder Peter Diamandis hopes it might be able to buy better health. Today the X Prize Foundation, which funds global competitions to spark development of breakthrough technologies, announced a … Read More
November 27, 2023
(STAT News) – Today, our nation faces a meteoric rise in metabolic disease that is showing up in end-of-life care in a devastating way. The increasing prevalence of metabolic disease combined with an aging population and a critical shortage of … Read More
November 27, 2023
(Vox) – The country is inching toward universal coverage. If everybody who qualified for either the ACA’s financial assistance or its Medicaid expansion were successfully enrolled in the program, we would get closer still: More than half of the uninsured … Read More
November 20, 2023
(Ars Technica) – UnitedHealthcare, the largest health insurance company in the US, is allegedly using a deeply flawed AI algorithm to override doctors’ judgments and wrongfully deny critical health coverage to elderly patients. This has resulted in patients being kicked … Read More
November 14, 2023
(New York Times) – The United States has no coherent system of long-term care, mostly a patchwork. The private market where a minuscule portion of families buy long-term care insurance has shriveled, reduced over years of giant rate hikes by … Read More
November 14, 2023
(STAT News) – The nation’s largest health insurance company pressured its medical staff to cut off payments for seriously ill patients in lockstep with a computer algorithm’s calculations, denying rehabilitation care for older and disabled Americans as profits soared, a … Read More
November 8, 2023
(CNN) – Older adults who don’t smoke tobacco but do use marijuana were at higher risk of both heart attack and stroke when hospitalized, while people who use marijuana daily were 34% more likely to develop heart failure, according to … Read More
November 7, 2023
(Washington Post) – Longevity has become an industry, a subject of bestsellers, podcasts and newsletters. But is a life meted out in metrics, often for a price, worth it? (Read More)