Aging/Older Adults

Over 25 speaker presentations from the 20th Annual State Health Policy Conference in Denver. Workshop sessions include State Children’s Health Insurance Program, Health Care Reform, Early Childhood Development, Managed Long-Term Care, Quality Improvement and Measurement, Patient Assessment, State Initiatives on Nursing Homes and Increased Community Care, and Medicaid Funding. Review the presentations and other hot topics in state health policy.

This MIT Report offers a ten-point plan to start a statewide conversation on change, a research summary on the role that families play as a "shadow workforce" in geriatric healthcare system, and expert commentary on the issues surrounding family caregiver support programs. This new report points the way for state-level action to support family caregivers and for state-level public policy to improve quality of life.

An example of how ADRCs can stay connected, Washington uses a simple text-only format for their newsletter that is meant to bypass spam filters. The text also allows people to "rip-and-read" so they can easily take the information out to use in other settings. There are no attachments, as requested by the newsletter recipients. The newsletter is published monthly and features Local Happenings, National News, and Job Postings.

As part of the January 2008 Monthly ADRC TAE call, Dorie Seavey and Hollis Turnham presented the idea of worker registries. Supporting materials offer an overview of the concept and state examples. Also included is a two-page hand out that lists worker registry websites and offers and example of the database potential functionalities.

The Vermont ADRC publishes this bi-monthly newsletter to keep partners and staff connected to the activities of the grant within the two local pilot regions and nationally. They will use this newsletter to highlight key activities of the grant: progress in establishing partnerships across service networks, cross training, utilization of refer and other resource databases, the formative evaluation, and community events.

This memorandum of understanding was signed as part of the Vermont ADRC project between the Vermont Department of Aging and Independent Living and the Department of Children and Families (Medicaid). The MOU is informative for streamlining access efforts. Other ADRCs designing programs will find this MOU a useful example.

As part of the Oklahoma Real Choice Systems Change Grant, Oklahoma developed a number of training tools for their partnership members. The group consisted of Consumer Consultants and Grant Partners. The presentations and handouts describe roles, working as a team, communication, decision making, policy history, state specific divisions and services and the ADvantage program.

The Minnesota Department of Human Services, through its Continuing Care Administration, is seeking Proposals from qualified Responders to work with DHS staff and key stakeholders to complete a State Long-Term Care Profile. A State Profile tool was developed by Thomson Medstat under contract with CMS. The Profile must describe the state’s long-term care delivery system for 7 population groups that account for the majority of people who need hcbs in MN. Proposals are due January 28, 2008.

This guide offers a quick reference on housing resources that can be used to create integrated, affordable, and accessible housing and basic information on how to use these resources. Including community strategies that increase the amount of integrated, affordable, and accessible housing units that usually fall into three general categories: development of housing units; access to existing housing units; and asset development.

The out-of-pocket cost of caring for an aging parent or spouse averages $5,531 a year, according to the nation's first in-depth study of such expenses, a sum that is more than double previous estimates and more than the average American household spends each year on health care and entertainment combined. This Evercare/NAC study found that as many as 17 million people care for a loved one 50 years or older and are spending more than 10 percent of their annual income on caregiving expenses.