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Health issues are a vital concern for older adults, and surveys show that most of those who go online search for health and medical information. However, since only 34 percent of people age 65 and older are online, the majority of older adults are missing out on valuable health information.
To broaden the numbers of older adults able to search for and find reliable health information online, the National Institute on Aging (NIA) has developed a free training curriculum for those who teach and work with older adults. This “Toolkit for Trainers” is available at NIHSeniorHealth.gov, a senior-friendly Web site developed by the NIA and the National Library of Medicine (NLM), components of the National Institutes of Health (NIH).
“Research has shown that age is no hindrance to computer or Internet use. But proper training is important to build computer confidence and Internet skills in older people,” said NIA Director Richard J. Hodes, MD. “This training program is designed to open up the Internet to older adults who want to know more about the health issues facing them as they age.”
The Toolkit for Trainers can augment computer training programs at public libraries, senior centers, community colleges, and lifelong learning centers, places where older adults typically take computer courses. Instructors at these locations can use the curriculum to teach older adults how to find accurate, up-to-date online health information on their own. To make sure the training curriculum meets the learning needs of older adults, NIA developers based its design on cognitive aging and vision research and field tested the materials with older adults and instructors in computer classes.
In addition to Web skills development, the easy-to-use curriculum focuses on health and wellness information offered by NIHSeniorHealth and MedlinePlus. NIHSeniorHealth features short, easy-to-read segments of information that can be accessed in a variety of formats, including large-print type, open-captioned videos, and an audio version. MedlinePlus is NLM’s more detailed site for consumer health information.
Trainers who download the toolkit at www.nihseniorhealth.gov/toolkit will receive a set of materials they can customize to their students’ skill levels and interests. These include lesson plans, handouts, Web searching exercises, and illustrated glossaries. An introductory video gives a quick overview of the curriculum and a glimpse of Internet classes in action. Tips on how to set up a senior-friendly computer classroom also are provided.
The NIA leads the federal effort supporting and conducting research on aging and the health and well-being of older people. The NLM, the world’s largest library of the health sciences, creates and sponsors Web-based health information resources for the public and professionals.
NIH, a medical research agency, includes 27 institutes and centers and is a component of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. It is the primary federal agency for conducting and supporting basic, clinical, and translational medical research, and it investigates the causes, treatments, and cures for common and rare diseases. For more information about NIH and its programs, visit www.nih.gov.
Source: The National Institute on Aging
By Joanna B. Townsend
Kansas Senior Press Service
In Chariton County, Mo., there was a family, originally from Maryland and Virginia, composed of two parents, a brother of the mother, and 11 living children of the 13 babies born to the parents.
I remember this family from the perspective of the youngest grandchild born to the youngest of those 13 children. Often I remember the dinners eaten at this family’s huge dining table in a quite-large dining room in the original home built by its carpenter, who learned his trade in Maryland before coming west to Missouri. His daughter was my grandmother. It was she who bore the 13 children, and she is the only person I’ve known who was born, married, and died in the very same house.
Long before my arrival, a tradition had been established that the family would gather for reunions at this farm home every Fourth of July and Christmas. Because Missouri was late in updating its rural roads, my family, who lived in town, maintained a Model T Ford explicitly for transporting to the farm, over the rutted and muddy roads, the family members who arrived by train.
Even after the parents’ deaths, the living children continued the tradition of the two reunions. Two unmarried children lived on the place and acted as host and hostess, although the others felt their pride of partial ownership by contributing financially and intellectually by whatever means at their disposal. Their family loyalty was never in question. Their relationships were cemented by these reunions and the dinner-table talk. This was their adaptation of a family newsletter.
Gathered around the noon dinner table was an unusually diverse group. Each one appeared to have his or her specialty to contribute to the lively conversation. A husband of one daughter was depended upon to supply new jokes, and he could relate one on any topic chosen. Another husband, who headed a well-known printing company in St. Louis, Mo., could relate new business ideas and practices. A third man, a local banker, could regale the group with hilarious tales of the idiosyncrasies of the local populace. Still another of the males, a member of the county sheriff’s staff, could relate stories equal to any television or movie mystery. The pharmacist of the family could relate new medical miracles. There was always some chat about a promising new colt or the latest crop outlook and its price.
Not much chatter was heard from either the females or the children. The women were more concerned with delivering and serving many dishes of home-cooked specialties. The table conversations continued long after the final course had been served and eaten. Threats from the females were necessary to evacuate the table:
“If you don’t move so that we can wash these dishes, you won’t get any supper!”
The older cousins did not linger at table as long as the elders. They adjourned to the parlor, where the old wind-up Victrola enabled them to instruct the younger ones in the latest dance steps. Sometimes a cousin would lead a rabbit hunt for a younger child anxious to learn how it was done. Other times, card games solidified the gaps in the cousins’ ages. Regardless of these other inducements, to this youngster, the table talk was the most instructive and fascinating.
As the baby of them all, I listened from a separate card table in the corner—usually accompanied by an older female cousin. Not until I was married was I seated with my new husband at the Big Table.
I am still impressed at the conviviality and the evident contentment of those Christmas and Fourth of July meals, and at folks' willingness just to sit and talk. Southerners do have a reputation for being good story tellers and good conversationalists. I believe it is deserved.
Who has time these days for table talk? Who has such a family?
By Ric Trout
Kansas Senior Press Service
First growth, then income. If you’re like most investors, you want to achieve growth while you’re working and income after you retire. But that doesn’t necessarily make it smart to change your investment strategy when you retire by shifting your portfolio completely out of stocks into less volatile “income” investments like bonds and cash equivalents.
The tax bite
As a rule, stocks are more risky and volatile than other types of investments. Therefore, you might decide, as some retirees do, to sell your stocks and reinvest in less-risky securities to protect the gains you’ve achieved. But, unless the stocks you sell are in an individual retirement account or other tax-deferred retirement account, that move won’t preserve all of your accumulated gains. When you sell your stock, you’ll lose part of those gains to capital gains tax.
The inflation bug
You may also create another, potentially more serious, risk. Without stocks in your portfolio, you increase the risk that future inflation will seriously erode the real value of your investments and reduce your spending power.
Let’s look at some numbers. Social Security’s normal retirement age is gradually increasing. For someone born between 1943 and 1954, it’s 66. If you retired today at age 66, your additional life expectancy would be 20.2 years according to IRS tables. No one knows what the rate of inflation will be in the future. But, over the past 20 years, the Consumer Price Index (commonly used to measure inflation) has, on average, risen about 3 percent a year. If inflation continues at the same average rate for the next 20 years, you’d need more than $90,000 of income in 2025 to match the buying power of $50,000 today.
The best way to fight inflation is to have the potential to earn investment returns that will keep you ahead of the erosion in your purchasing power. The problem is that there’s no guarantee about the future returns of any variable investment.
A better way?
Instead of moving your entire portfolio out of stocks when you retire, you might consider other strategies. You could maintain your current portfolio mix until you retire, then gradually sell some of your stocks each year.
This strategy would slowly reduce your exposure to the risk of owning stocks and also generate income to supplement any cash dividends and interest income you receive. You’d spread out your capital gains taxes and be able to keep a large part of your portfolio invested in stocks for a considerable number of years. Note that through 2008, the federal tax rate on long-term capital gains is generally 15 percent for those in regular tax brackets higher than 15 percent. After that, the capital gains rate is scheduled to revert to the rate in effect before 2003, generally 20 percent.
Another strategy is simply to reduce the portion of your portfolio that is invested in stocks as retirement approaches. For example, if 75 percent of your portfolio is in stocks before retirement, you might lower that percentage to 30 percent or another percentage that you’re comfortable with. That way, you’d still retain some opportunity to gain from any future stock market advances, but you’d also reduce your portfolio’s overall volatility.
When you say goodbye to your job, sticking with stocks may be a better strategy for a potentially very long retirement than moving to an all-income portfolio. If you want to know more about investment strategies during retirement, consult with your financial planner.
Ric Trout, EdD, RHU, REBC is a registered representative and investment adviser. He can be reached at 913-451-1505 or 913-645-0986.
These articles are also available electronically at the Center on Aging Website: http://www2.kumc.edu/coa/Senior_Press_Article/Topic_Index.htm