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Supporting Changing Needs Through the End of Life for Adults with Disabilities in Residential Settings
Everyone changes with aging, often in invisible ways. You may be surprised to learn that beginning at age 25, there is a slow decline in speed, reasoning, spatial skills, and memory (Salthouse, 2009). At the age of 30, there is a 3-8% loss of muscle mass per decade (Volpi, 2004). By the age of 65,...
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Overdose Safety in Older Adults: The Critical Role of Zero Overdose
The United States is grappling with an escalating public health crisis as overdose deaths continue to rise, and recent data underscores a distressing rise in opioid misuse and related overdose deaths among older adults. In NYC, there was a staggering 12% rise in overdose deaths in 2022 alone,...
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Prevention Across the Lifespan: Substance Use Education and Screening Services for Older Adults
While older adulthood is a special time of life, it is also a time when older individuals may face health issues and life transitions. It can be a vulnerable time for mental health and can lead to a change in the way people use substances. New York State has the fourth-largest population of older...
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Innovative Delivery of Therapy for Older Adults with Depression
There are many changes that take place as we age, but many people assume that depression is a normal part of aging. Instead, depression is best thought of as a response to losses and changes associated with aging, and most importantly – it is treatable! In our work with community-dwelling older...
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Addressing the Unique Mental Health Challenges Brought on by Aging
Older adults are one of the fastest-growing demographics in the nation and in New York State. There are currently about 4.6 million New Yorkers who are 60 years of age or older and another 4.2 million between the ages of 45 and 59. Individuals with wisdom and life experience are a gift to...
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Addressing the Aging Crisis in New York’s Mental Health Housing
New York’s mental health and supportive housing system is currently facing a significant challenge: an aging population among its residents. Forty years ago, when the original funding and housing models were developed by state leadership, the longevity of residents was not a primary concern....
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Financial Insecurity in Geriatric Populations
People are living longer, and the cost of living continues to rise. Where does that leave our next generation of seasoned individuals once they can no longer work? Will my family have the means to take care of me? Do I have a family? Will I have financial insecurity? Can I afford a nursing home?...
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Elder Abuse and Mental Health: Victims, Perpetrators, and Potential for Change
Elder abuse is increasing in the United States (US) as more Americans age and become vulnerable to various forms of mistreatment (Chang & Levy, 2021). This kind of abuse can have significant effects on mental health, not only for older victims but for perpetrators of abuse,...
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Aging Vision: How Social Workers Can Help Address Vision Loss
What happens to someone who wakes up one morning and can no longer see? It could happen to any of us at any time – clinician or client. Stoic wisdom might suggest that one prepares for loss by imagining it has already happened and resolving to accept the change, to embrace life fully, whatever...
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Time to Confront the Challenges of an Aging America
America is aging rapidly.1 Over the next few decades, the proportion of adults 65 and older will come to exceed the proportion of children under 18 – an historic first.2 And as the number of older adults grows from approximately 56 million at the beginning of this decade to 85 million in 2050,3...
