Featured

According to the World Health Organization, more than 360 million people around the world have disabling hearing loss, which includes one-third of all people over 65 years old and one-half of those older than 75.

To draw attention to this crucial area, the USC Emeriti Center, House Research Institute and USC Disability Services and Programs teamed up to present the 2013 Hearing Health Symposium at the USC Leonard Davis School of Gerontology on Friday, April 19.

“No matter what your age, hearing clearly makes all the difference in quality of life. That’s why we held the USC Hearing Health Symposium: to showcase multiple perspectives discussing research, resources and how to find the best treatment for different types of hearing loss,” said Janette Brown, executive director of the USC Emeriti Center.

(l to r) James Boswell, CEO of the House Research Institute; Janette Brown, PhD, executive director of the USC Emeriti Center; Pinchas Cohen, MD, dean of the USC Leonard Davis School; John House, MD of the House Clinic and House Research Institute

“Today’s event represents a tremendous opportunity to engage so many in an incredibly important topic. In gerontology, we talk a lot about the spans—life span, health span, wealth span—but I’d like to coin a new term today: hearing span,” said Pinchas Cohen, dean of the USC Leonard Davis School. “Hearing loss is in essence, an age-related disease. We have to address this more closely in the gerontology community and I’m looking forward to a partnership with the scientists and attendees of today’s event.”

The three panel discussions—“Exploring Your Hearing Health,” “Latest Research, Communication and Effective Self-Advocacy” and “What’s New – Assistive Devices, Technologies, Community Resources”—were moderated by James D. Boswell, CEO of the House Research Institute, Charlotte Schamadan of the House Research Institute and Kenneth J. Lopez of the USC Thornton School of Music respectively. The panels, organized by Marilee Potthoff from the House Research Institute, featured such speakers as the House Clinic and House Research Institute’s John W. House, Katherine Hammons of USC Disability Services, John Orr of the USC Emerti Center/USC Retired Faculty Association, Ryan Epoch of Contacta, Inc. and Roberta Smith of California Telephone Access Program.

Throughout the event, a Hearing Health Awareness fair was held in the USC Leonard Davis School courtyard, which included samples of a proposed shell-shaped, universal symbol designed by Mary Lou Dauray to indicate hearing loss.

“The time is ripe for a symbol to identify those with hearing loss as well as those situations detrimental and dangerous for the hearing-impaired,” Dauray said. “Whether it is worn as a pin or posted in areas or on products, the ‘Hear I Am’ logo elegantly communicates crucial concerns. Hearing loss is an invisible disability we should make visible.”

With questions and answer sessions, networking opportunities and multiple booths, panelists and attendees alike were able to reaffirm their commitment to increasing awareness, advocacy, treatment and options for those affected by hearing loss. Just as important, however, was the story of how the symposium came to be in the first place.

“I’m especially proud that today reminds us that USC’s retired faculty and staff are invaluable contributors to the USC community,” Brown said. “Today’s symposium took place because of the interest of professor emeritus John Orr. Every day and every year, the USC Emeriti Center is enriched and changed based on the wisdom of our retirees, and I encourage everyone to consider adding their unique voice to ours.”

The event, which was closed-captioned as well as made accessible by a sign language interpreter and hearing assistance devices, is also available in its entirety online at the USC Emeriti Center website (http://emeriti.usc.edu).

The 33^rd annual meeting of the California Council on Gerontology and Geriatrics (CCGG) proved a time for paying tribute to the past while looking towards the future. Held at USC’s Davidson Conference Center on Friday, April 12, the meeting’s theme was “Aligning Workforce Development with Behavioral Health Care Needs of Older Californians.”

Associate Dean of the USC Leonard Davis School of Gerontology and president of CCGG, Maria Henke

“It is so inspiring to see how far we have come, as a field and as an organization,” said Maria Henke, associate dean of the USC Leonard Davis School of Gerontology and president of CCGG. “This Meeting is always an opportunity to honor the pioneers of aging while also shining the spotlight on the next generation of leaders.”

With multiple poster and networking breakout sessions, the meeting also featured five panels: “Future Trends in Maximizing the Health & Wellbeing of California’s Diverse Older Adult Population: What The Data Tells Us”; “A National Call to Action: The Institute of Medicine Report on the Mental Health and Substance Use Workforce for Older Adults”; “Making the Most of the IoM Recommendations for California”; “Policy Opportunities In a Changing Health and Behavioral Health Delivery System”; and “Using Evidence-Based Practices with Diverse Community Populations.”

With a distinguished group of speakers who included Laura Trejo of the Los Angeles Department of Aging; Gretchen Alkema of the SCAN Foundation and JoAnn Damron-Rodriguez of the California Geriatric Education Center, the meeting also showcased the work of researchers both at USC and around the state.

Tara Gruenewald, PhD, Phoebe Liebig, PhD, and Patrick Beck

USC Leonard Davis School of Gerontology Trojans were especially well represented when it came to the award recipients: Phoebe Liebig won the Lifetime Achievement Award, Tara Gruenewald won the Betty and James E. Birren Emerging Leadership Award and Patrick Beck won the David A. Peterson Student Achievement Award. In fact, Beck used his acceptance speech to salute the legendary 95-year-old gerontologist.

“Jim Birren: thank you for creating CCGG and the field of gerontology as well as serving as the founding dean of the USC Leonard Davis School. Without you, none of us would be here today,” Beck said. “The day that I decided to study gerontology changed my life, and I say now to all the students present: I hope today is equally life-changing for you.”

Honoring both Birrens became a theme of the event, with a special slideshow tribute to the late Betty. Also thanking the first couple of gerontology was Jolene Fassbinder, the previous executive director for CCGG, who was visibly moved to tears when Henke surprised her with an award.

“Thank you everyone. I wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for Jim and Betty Birren,” Fassbinder said. “Betty Birren was executive director of CCGG for 30 years. I am proud to have followed in her footsteps for seven.”

Dean Pinchas Cohen, MD and Jim Birren, PhD

The highlight of the event came with Birren himself took the podium, receiving a standing ovation as the slideshow featured images of his and Betty’s 70-year-long marriage.

“It takes a long time to raise a husband,” he said. “Betty and I have always been so proud of this meeting and so impressed with the vigor and vision of gerontologists. As we say at USC: Fight On!”

USC Leonard Davis School of Gerontology doctoral students Patrick Beck and Morgan Levine made a strong showing at USC’s Fifth Annual Graduate Research Symposium. Beck won first place in the Social Sciences, Arts and Humanities category while Levine took third in the Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) category.

Beck presented research aimed at helping older or physically challenged adults remain in their homes longer by providing a universal design educational intervention following a major insurance claim.

“With six percent of the 130,000,000 homes in the United States filing an insurance claim every year, this is an opportunity to make home modifications following a major insurance claim. Because the home is already damaged, it might be easier to modify the existing environment,” Beck said. “This is important, because 96% of older adults want to remain in their homes and communities, and this is a great way to help them do it.”

Levine presented research studying whether long-lived smokers represented a biologically resilient phenotype.

“Using two nationally representative populations I showed that long-lived smokers did not have an increased mortality risk from smoking but instead had similar lung function, inflammatory, and immune activation levels to individuals who had never smoked,” Levine said. “I could use lung function and inflammation to quantify ‘resiliency’ and predict who might become a long-lived smoker when looking at a younger population.”

Beck will receive a $1,500 fellowship. He hopes to extrapolate this research into a larger population while also continuing his study of fall prevention. Levine will receive a $500 fellowship and plans to further explore genetic factors among long-lived smokers in the hope that her work will benefit all populations by translating to additional environmental hazards such as pollution.

Both students gave credit to faculty advisors and colleagues, with Beck thanking Jon Pynoos, Susan Enguídanos, Greg Misiaszek, Emily Nabors, Anna Nguyen and Dana Kumabe while Levine thanked Eileen Crimmins, Caleb Finch, Jennifer Ailshire, Tara Gruenewald and Edward Schneider.

“The research presented during the STEM session was tremendously impressive, so I am thrilled to have done so well and to know that scientists outside of my field found my research important and exciting,” Levine said. “Furthermore, as a woman, I am extremely proud given that, unfortunately, women are underrepresented in STEM fields.”

“This was an amazing opportunity to present our findings and to increase the knowledge and visibility of our field,” Beck said. “Even though Gerontology may be a small School at USC, we are making a huge impact that is changing the world.”

It’s that time again for the USC Leonard Davis School’s annual interdisciplinary symposium, “What’s Hot in Aging Research at USC?” This year’s meeting, to be held on April 22, 2013, will focus on “Integrated Approaches to the Study of Aging” and will unite experts from across USC’s campus in the field of aging and aging-related science.

With a registration fee of $25, which includes lunch and parking, the all-day event promises to be the biggest and best yet in the School’s history.

“We’re so proud that ‘What’s Hot in Aging Research at USC’ has grown into one of our School’s flagship events,” said Associate Dean Maria Henke. “It is so inspiring to see experts who span the full scope of USC’s most cutting-edge aging research uniting in one place to share their awe-inspiring work.”

For more information, visit gero.usc.edu/USCAgingResearch

“Head Above Water” – a mixed media by Orna Makleff

Climate change doesn’t just threaten our planet; it also poses enormous challenges for older adults, say acclaimed artists Mary Lou Dauray and Orna Makleff.

Inspired to take creative action and draw attention to this global problem, the two have created an artistic exhibition, “Aging People/Aging Planet,” which will run from March 2 through June 21 at USC’s Institute for Genetic Medicine Art Gallery at the Keck School of Medicine.

“Our hope is that the show will inspire people to use art as a tool to teach the younger generation to express their concerns for this situation,” Dauray said. “We want them to realize that everyone has the innate potential to creatively help our planet.”

The seed for the show was planted back in 2003, after the most intense heat wave since 1540 swept Europe, leaving thousands of older adults dead. Horrified by the events, Dauray and Makleff began to research the connections between massive climate change and the health of the population most susceptible to it: the elderly.

According to a recent report by the National Institutes on Health: “Elderly adults living in poverty or on limited fixed incomes may lack resources to pay for air conditioning during heat waves, they may live in substandard housing that leaves them more vulnerable to flooding and strong winds, or they may not have easy access to social services or to adequate transportation to evacuate when devastating weather events occur. In additional, functional and physiological limitations associated with aging could impede elderly people’s ability to adapt.”

“Ice Cave” – a watercolor by Mary Lou Dauray

So what can be done?  One solution to both substandard housing and the unique challenges to the elderly during natural disasters is universal design.  This includes a set of principles that create safe and accessible environments and communities for people of all ages and abilities.  Additionally, increased awareness by all ages of this population’s potential vulnerability can go a long way in preventing unnecessary tragedy and hardship.

Makleff and Dauray hope that their show will open eyes and hearts as well as start important discussions that don’t just concern older adults but also include and empower them. Making all this possible is the transformative power of art: a force as universal as the weather itself.

“Making art always been a way to learn, to see and to teach,” Dauray said. “With this show, our hope is that our art will speak eloquently to a worldwide issue and potentially help effect real change.”

“Aging People/Aging Planet” opens on March 2, 2013 with a celebration from 4-6 pm and runs through June 21, 2013 at USC’s Institute for Genetic Medicine Art Gallery at the Keck School of Medicine (2250 Alcazar Street, CSC 240) in Los Angeles, CA.

ElderBranch, a resource for people looking for senior careproviders, recently published a series of articles regarding end-of-life care: where we are today, innovative models and interviews with experts.

Below is an excerpt from our interview with Susan Enguídanos, PhD, of the USC Leonard Davis School of Gerontology about a palliative care program that she helped design in partnership with Partners in Care Foundation.

ELDERBRANCH: Generally speaking, what’s broken, missing or lacking when it comes to end-of-life care?

SUSAN ENGUIDANOS: One of the biggest problems is that end of life really starts sooner – in terms of the decline. People get end-of-life care usually in the last three weeks of life, which is in hospice, but you really don’t have any other mechanism in our system to address the decline that starts much earlier.

Our whole health care system is designed to cure and provide care for people who are healthy and can navigate the system, but we don’t have anything that provides the other needs that people have as they start to decline and experience serious health problems.

ELDERBRANCH: Can you describe the Kaiser Permanente program that you helped design?

SUSAN ENGUIDANOS: In terms of the model, it looks a lot like hospice. We have physicians, social workers, nurses, homes health aides, chaplains and it’s all home-based. The frequency of it is predicated on the needs of the patient.

One of the other critical components is that they have access to information – medical personnel, 24 hours a day. So if they had a crisis, they could pick up the phone, call somebody, and reach a nurse who can reach a doctor at any time. What we’re finding in some of the work I’m doing right now is [that among] patients that have been readmitted to the hospital, we’re finding that access in a crisis is a key issue as to why people end up back in the emergency room. It’s not necessarily their first choice, but they didn’t feel like they had an alternative.

ELDERBRANCH: Do palliative care programs actually escalate total costs of care?

SUSAN ENGUIDANOS: For the palliative care team, the right decision isn’t around financing, it’s around what does the patient really want in their last years of life. What type of trajectory and care treatment are well-suited, and providing them information about what their trade-offs are. What [are] your options if you decide not to do aggressive care, or what the odds of survival are if you have a heart condition and cancer.

The other research that just came out found that people actually live longer because they make different decisions. They have fewer episodes of chemo and radiation but they live longer. We found that if we gave them more care in the home, they either didn’t need or decided not to pursue aggressive care.

ELDERBRANCH: While there is a Medicare hospice benefit, there isn’t something similar for palliative care. How are palliative care programs being paid for and is that a factor when thinking about broader adoption of these kinds of models?

SUSAN ENGUIDANOS: That has been the primary barrier in disseminating the model and promoting replication. [Given] the Kaiser structure is completely a closed system, they can move funds around to cover whatever they want. In systems that aren’t like the VA or Kaiser, there’s always going to be a winner and a loser, and the loser is the person paying for the services and the winner is the person saving money.

We have to figure out how to reimburse these services in a way that there’s not a “loser.” That’s exactly why a lot of these models don’t have the social worker or the chaplain; they have the nurse practitioner and the physician because they can charge for home visits. So that’s a huge barrier in terms of why we haven’t had better success in getting this replicated.

Elderbranch’s complete interview with Dr. Enguídanos, as well as the complete series on end-of-life care can be found in the following parts: I, II, III, IV.