Ongoing Coverage:

Tagged: elderly

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Senior Citizens
2:15 pm
Sat November 5, 2011

Playground for senior citizens opens in Ohio

Credit The Royal Parks website
This senior playground is located in a British park

A community near Akron, Ohio opened a new playground last week - one specially designed for senior citizens.
    

The Akron Beacon Journal reports that the playground consists of eight pieces of low-impact athletic equipment designed for older adults.
    

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Offbeat
1:14 pm
Sat August 6, 2011

Ohio woman granted canoe wish, despite her fear of water

Credit Margaret Sutton/Creative Commons

A 78-year-old woman says a 6-mile canoe trip down a river in northeast Ohio was a dream come true. That’s despite the fact that she’s afraid of water.

Kay Riffle took her first canoe ride thanks partly to the Second Wind Dreams group. The nonprofit organization works to help grant dreams for seniors.

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Politics
4:27 pm
Tue June 14, 2011

Elder abuse legislation unveiled

A proposal to encourage more reporting of senior abuse and strengthen penalties against people convicted of the abuse will be unveiled tomorrow at the state Capitol.

The measure will deal with physical and financial abuse of elderly people.

Republican state Senator Tanya Schuitmaker has worked on the issue for a couple years.

“You hear all too often about many cases that—where seniors are getting defrauded and certainly there are vulnerable adults out there that need to be protected.”

“I think [the proposal] strengthens and tightens the regulations that are also there. It also adds some assistance in terms of when someone with Alzheimer’s walks away that there’s a system of alert similar to the Amber Alert.”

Schuitmaker will introduce the bills during “Older Michiganians Day” at the Capitol. She expects the Legislature to vote on the measure this fall.

Medicine
12:30 pm
Fri January 28, 2011

21% of Michigan nursing home patients neglected -MSU study

Credit (photo by Steve Carmody/Michigan Radio)

A new Michigan State University study finds more than one in five Michigan nursing home patients is neglected. 


 The study examined cases of physical neglect, in which the caregiver failed or refused to meet a resident’s needs of food, water, personal hygiene, clothing, medicine, shelter, personal safety or comfort.

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Substance abuse & older Michiganders
2:25 pm
Mon October 18, 2010

The number of older Michiganders in substance abuse treatment doubles in a decade

 The number of adults over 50 entering into substance abuse treatment nearly doubled in Michigan during the past decade, according to a new state health department study.

 The Department of Community Health compared data on substance abuse treatment admissions from 2000 and 2009. 

Alcohol was and is the main reason most older adults ended up in treatment Michigan.

A decade ago, alcohol was the reason 85% of older Michiganders ended up in substance abuse treatment.  But by 2009,  that percentage dropped to 59%.

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