Technology For Seniors

A bold claim has appeared in the journal Alzheimer’s and Dementia which shows that neurological damage in Covid-19 patients may be more severe than that of an Alzhiemer’s patient.

“Specifically, a team from NYU Grossman School of Medicine found significantly higher levels of certain blood proteins, which typically arise when someone suffers neurological damage among COVID patients. Researchers say, over the short-term course of their infections, seven markers of brain damage were noticeably higher among COVID patients than non-COVID patients with Alzheimer’s. One of these markers was more than twice as high among coronavirus patients.

“Our findings suggest that patients hospitalized for COVID-19, and especially in those experiencing neurological symptoms during their acute infection, may have levels of brain injury markers that are as high as, or higher than, those seen in people who have Alzheimer’s disease,” says lead author Jennifer Frontera, MD, a professor in the Department of Neurology, in a university release.”

The study was normalized for age groups, and still they found a significant correlation. Ever since the beginnings of the pandemic, there have been reports of “long Covid”; people suffering vascular and neurological symptoms months after the primary infection has cleared. This study showing drastically increased biomarkers detectable in a blood test, may be able to more fully explain this phenomenon.

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An elderly relative wandering off never to be seen again is the single greatest fear of most caregivers. Simply put, there is no way to completely safeguard against it, but there are some steps which can be taken to help prevent a wandering incident.

Identity jewelry or cards. The old standby of a piece of jewelry – be it a bracelet, pendant or other – with their name and contact info for a caregiver is still one of the best safeguards. It won’t prevent a wandering incident, but it will help get them home after one. If they won’t wear jewelry, make sure they have cards with your cell phone number printed on them in their wallet, purse or coat.

Door alarms. Another simple but very effective tool. An alarm which goes off whenever the door it is mounted on is opened. Our own SMPL Entry Alert is one such device. The wireless alarm receiver can be carried around the home, so you will always know when your door is opened.

Experts recommend pairing the alarm with a basic chain or slide lock from the hardware store, which will delay their exit without locking them in. That little bit of time needed to open the lock can give you the chance to intercept them.

GPS Trackers. This is a more extreme measure, but it may be an option for many. Most personal GPS trackers take the form of a watch. At any time a caregiver can access an app or web portal to quickly locate the wearer on a map. Most of these devices also allow for 2 way voice communication in the event of an emergency.

“Have You Seen Me” Cards. Another analog tool which won’t stop a wandering event, but may help get them home safely & quickly. These are simply cards you have printed up – maybe the size of a postcard – with your loved one’s picture & name, with your contact info on it. You distribute these to places within walking distance where your loved one may go to: stores, restaurants, businesses, libraries, houses of worship. If they are seen by workers in those places, they can call you or EMS to help bring them home safely.

At the end of the day, the most

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And the culprit is: the Epstein-Barr virus.

“The hypothesis that EBV (Epstein-Barr virus) causes MS has been investigated by our group and others for several years, but this is the first study providing compelling evidence of causality,” said Alberto Ascherio, professor of epidemiology and nutrition at Harvard Chan School and senior author of the study. “This is a big step because it suggests that most MS cases could be prevented by stopping EBV infection, and that targeting EBV could lead to the discovery of a cure for MS.”

So the good news is that we know pretty definitively what causes MS. The bad news: EVS is one of the most common viruses on earth – it’s estimated that 95% of adults have it in their bodies – and it’s already associated with a raft of diseases ranging from herpes to mononucleosis to multiple cancers and lymphomas.

But there’s good news here, too. This means that research into EVS – be it detection, vaccination or treatment – will have even more benefit to humanity. A vector to attack this virus could potentially do more to help public health than any treatment in decades.

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From Massive Science, a look at how advances can come from the oddest places.

“In the early 1980s, doctors across northern California encountered patients with curious symptoms. From Watsonville to San Jose, young people were experiencing a combination of visual hallucinations, jerking limbs, and stiffness. Their abilities to move and speak worsened over a space of mere weeks, and by the time they sought medical help they had become totally immobile.

In San Jose’s Santa Clara Valley Medical Center, psychiatrists insisted that their medical mystery patient had a neurological disorder. However, neurologists were adamant that the patient was undergoing a psychiatric episode. Amidst the arguments, Director of Neurology, William Langston, noticed a striking resemblance of the patient’s condition to that of Parkinson’s disease (PD). They were alert, but their body was rigid – with an arm involuntarily raised for long periods of time. PD is the second most common neurodegenerative disorder (behind Alzheimer’s disease), and the most common neurodegenerative movement disorder worldwide, but it is typically associated with old age, and symptoms develop over a period of years – not weeks.”

Basically, before you can test treatments for a symptom, you must be able to simulate that symptom in cells or test animals. For decades scientists had struggled to simulate Parkinson’s Disease in a clinical setting. The discovery that certain synthetic heroin could do that allowed for most of the advances in treatment in the last 30+ years for that disease.

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From the journal of Biotech & Genetic Engineering:

The results of an open-label pilot study have found that treating patients with an advanced form of age-related macular degeneration (AMD) using the Parkinson’s disease drug, levodopa, stabilized their disease and improved vision. The study demonstrated that oral levodopa therapy was safe and well-tolerated, and reduced the need for patients with neovascular AMD (nAMD) to receive anti-VEGF injections.

Short version: the same drug which seemed to help macular degeneration (MD) patients, also seems to help those with Parkinson’s disease. How much it helps remains to be seen, but further studies are in the works.

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Making sure seniors get proper nutrition can often be a struggle. But that doesn’t mean mealtime has to be like wartime. With the appropriate preparation and mindset, you can help ensure your senior loved ones enjoy coming down to the dinner table while eating well in the process. 

Routine, routine, routine. – I make this point a lot in these blogs, but I cannot stress enough how beneficial a firm – but not totally inflexible – routine can be. Having a designated time and place for meals not only helps improve seniors’ sense of time, but it also allows their bodies proper time to digest. These routines should not be immutable – if you want to go out with friends, do so, even if it means eating a bit earlier or later – but by keeping to this schedule most of the time, you substantially cut down on meal-related disagreements and flare-ups. 

Ergonomic & Safety Tableware – Even the mechanics of eating can be difficult for some seniors. Arthritic hands can’t always hold a knife and fork very well, much less bring a full glass to their lips. There are tools you can use to make mealtime less of a struggle. 

• Flatware with ergonomic grips, typically larger, rounded & textured. 
• Smaller, lighter & shatterproof drinking cups.
• “Move-resistant” plates & bowls. These typically are either heavier or have ‘grippy’ undersides, to prevent them from sliding around the table. This can also be accomplished with textured placemats.
• Plates & bowls with lips. These not only make them easier to grip and lift, but they also give you a surface to push food against. 

Make sure they have a diet they can live with – Almost all of us “are on a diet,” and that includes seniors. Dietary restrictions tend to accumulate as one ages, and keeping them all in mind when meal planning can be a daunting task. But a diet which is indistinguishable from prison food helps no one. If your senior loved one has a particularly challenging set of dietary restrictions, you really may want to consult with a nutritionist. They not only can tell you what to avoid, but they can also help select foods to replace those you’ve cut out. Most of us are not professional cooks, and even a little guidance can help make mealtimes fun for everyone in the home. 

Do not infantilize your senior loved ones – Reading all of these suggestions, it sometimes sounds like feeding an elder loved one is no different than feeding a child. But it’s critically important to remember not to treat them like children. They see the similarities too and are almost certainly quite sensitive to that comparison. Seniors suffer a lot of indignities, but being treated like an infant by people they very likely raised is one they should never have to deal with. No matter how difficult or frustrating mealtimes become, you must treat them with respect and dignity. In other words: how you would expect to be treated.

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Sometimes the greatest hurdles when growing old are technological. Seniors often lack the muscle memory or ingrained experiences to properly use modern conveniences. But that doesn’t mean those experiences cannot be made more accessible with some basic tools and aids.

Bluetooth hearing aids – An old medical device, with a modern twist. These hearing aids can connect to audio sources via Bluetooth, allowing persons with hearing impairment to get the sound directly from the source. By connecting wirelessly to your stereo, computer or TV, the wearer can hear their media clearly without boosting all other sounds around them. Many such hearing aids can also boost the clarity of spoken words, helping those with conditions like auditory neuropathy or tinnitus.

Vertical Mice – 90 degrees can make a world of difference. Vertical mice function just like normal mice, but are ergonomically designed to alleviate stresses on the hand, wrist and forearm. They’re often used by sufferers of carpal tunnel syndrome or chronic wrist tendonitis, but they can be extremely beneficial for arthritis sufferers, too. 

Digital Magnifiers – These relatively inexpensive items combine a camera and a screen to help magnify small text or objects for the reader. They have several advantages over your basic looking glass, including the ability to take still images, and even to digitally highlight or sharpen text to make it easy to read. Some now even have the ability to ‘read’ text and convert it to speech on the fly. This is a tremendous aide for persons with compromised vision who don’t want to stop living life to its fullest. 

Large-Button or Simplified TV Remotes – We take the remote control for granted. I’m sure a lot of people reading this may never have used a TV without one. But as you grow older, they can become a problem. For starters, the buttons are getting smaller and harder to press in modern remotes. A remote with larger buttons and ergonomic casing can help with that. But then you get to the issue of too many buttons. Modern remotes have so many functions which the average user will rarely – if ever – utilize. In those cases, a simplified remote with fewer functions may be helpful. 

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Most of us may be staying at home for everyone’s safety, but that doesn’t mean criminals aren’t still operating in full force. Here are some tips to help keep you safe & secure during these trying times.

• Scammers are out in force trying to use Covid to get into people’s bank accounts. Be particularly wary about clicking links in messages sent to you. Neither the IRS nor any state unemployment will send out random links via text message or email, and they will never ask you for critical identifiers like social security numbers over unsecured lines like that.
• We’re all ordering more online these days, and package thieves are having a field day. And many package carriers simply will not ring doorbells now, even though most of the population is home all day. So you have to take matters into your own hands with a motion detector, which will alert you when a package arrives so you can retrieve it quickly.
• While home break-ins are down, car break-ins are up. Make sure your car is locked and there are no items visible in the cabin.
• Since we’re spending so much more time there, our homes are dealing with added wear & tear. Make sure critical functions – particularly plumbing and heating/AC – are working well. Service techs are also booked more than typical now, so it may take longer to get a service appointment than usual. If you suspect something is wrong, act soon so it doesn’t become a crisis.

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Barely a day goes by without reading stories like this about seniors being taken advantage of by scammers. But, you and your loved ones don’t have to be victimized this way. 

Here are some general tips to help safeguard your elder loved ones:

Designate a financial “advocate” – Find someone – a spouse, a child, or a sibling – whom the senior trusts implicitly, and consult with them on significant financial matters. You can additionally add that person to major accounts, or share log-in information with them. This will allow the trusted family member to both monitor account activity, and make it easier to use those resources for the good of the care recipient. Younger, more tech-savvy people are often better at spotting fraud patterns than their elders and can help cut off scammers or identify self-destructive actions taken by the senior. 

Make a will, and have it updated every 2-3 years – Thinking about a will is never particularly pleasant, but it’s a necessary task. Knowing their affairs will be in order when they pass away can be a tremendous stress reliever for seniors. Gather up all major assets – real estate, investments, pensions, life insurance policies, etc. – and make sure they are included in the will. You will eventually need a lawyer for a will, and your state or provincial Bar Association can help direct you to a trusted estate attorney. 

Lock their credit – A senior having their bank account drained by a scammer can be awful, but having their credit ruined by identity thieves can be catastrophic. Compromised credit history can not only impact their ability to pay bills, but it can also prevent them from qualifying for aid and assistance programs, potentially including Medicare. A trusted family member should help the senior contact the three major credit reporting agencies – Equifax, Experian, and TransUnion – and arrange to have a lock placed on their credit. This will prevent access to their credit history and will prevent the opening of new credit cards, loans, bank & investment accounts while the lock is in place. The lock can only be removed via a password or other identifying information, which makes it much more difficult for scammers.

Review subscriptions and other recurring charges – This probably holds true for all of us, but it’s particularly true for seniors. Go through all credit cards & bank statements for recurring expenses. Things like magazine & newspaper subscriptions, club dues, out of date service contracts, auto-renewing extended warranties, and more small recurring charges can add up to a pretty penny. Find out which are still useful, and spend an afternoon canceling the rest.  

Have a frank conversation about scam avoidance – As we age, our ability to “sniff out” scams and fraud often begins to fail. Tricks and ploys which wouldn’t have made a dent in their earlier years suddenly begin to succeed. At this point, the financial advocate or other loved ones need to step in and have a conversation about ways to avoid these pitfalls. These include: 

• Do not buy anything from people who call or come to the door. No matter how good they make a deal look, cold-callers & door-to-door salespeople are all too frequently unethical or downright criminal.
• Never, ever buy gift cards for any reason. All too many scams now revolve around the purchasing of gift cards, mainly because the cards are easily transferrable and non-refundable or disputable. By refusing to buy any gift cards, they can protect themselves against many of the most common and damaging scams in practice today.
• Make sure their computers, if they use them, have modern anti-virus and anti-malware programs active & updated. 
• Set up a password with the family. Pick a random word out of the dictionary – or even better, a word which has meaning to the senior – and tells it to close family, and only close family. Write the password somewhere that casual visitors or aides won’t see it. If a family member really does need help, they can supply the password. If they don’t, you know that call or message isn’t genuine. 

You cannot protect someone from all scams, but these are just a few simple actions that can help protect your loved ones against the fraudsters out there. 

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In the year 2020, we have so many choices for entertainment that we are paralyzed by the options available. But our senior loved ones grew up in a simple era, one where there may have only been three television stations to watch (if that many). That lack of options means people from that era tend to have very similar cultural touchstones. Everyone watched MASH, Ed Sullivan, and Gunsmoke, and that common thread can be something to help senior bond. The only problem is finding those shows nowadays. Some shows – Jack Benny or classic Doctor Who, for example – are unwatchable simply because no copies exist of many episodes. But, many of the most popular shows of the era are available through one of the primary streaming services.

The following is a selection of  classic TV shows, and the streaming services they can be found on:

Netflix: The Andy Griffith Show, Cheers, Star Trek, Gilligan’s Island, The Addams Family, Hogan’s Heroes, Bewitched

Amazon Prime: The Carol Burnett Show, Mission: Impossible, The Brady Bunch, Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood, Green Acres, Car 54 Where Are You.

Hulu: Sesame Street, The Beverly Hillbillies, Lost in Space, Mister Ed, The Dick Van Dyke Show, I Spy.

These streaming services can be accessed through any computer, or set top streaming devices like Apple TV, Roku or Amazon Fire. Pairing these devices with the smpl Universal Remote will make them even more accessible to your senior loved one.

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