EVERYTHING LISTED UNDER: Research

Reap the benefits of health, happiness and gratitude on your next journey. [Photo credit: Adobe Stock][/caption]By Wendy Sue Knecht for Next AvenueSome people are just lucky — they’re born with it. I’m not talking about good looks or money. I’m talking about wanderlust …. that something inside of you that just makes you want to go places, explore and of course, wander.My own wanderlust was cultivated at a young age. Although my family never took anything but road trips growing up, my father used to regale me with bedtime stories of Gee Gee Go-Go, a fictional character who traveled all over the world on his tricycle. It’s no surprise I became a Pan Am flight attendant!

Most people think of dementia as affecting memory and cognition, and it certainly does. But some of the most distressing symptoms of Alzheimer’s or other dementias are behavioral and psychological.“What takes a lot of families by surprise are the things like agitation, problems sleeping, getting up and wandering; sometimes people even become violent,” said Dr. Keith Fargo, director of scientific programs and outreach for the Alzheimer’s Association. Some people exhibiting these kinds of behaviors have been treated with anti-psychotic drugs, which has sparked widespread criticism. And the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has mandated a black box warning on such drugs with older adults with dementia; they are associated with an increased risk of death.

Health care systems have very distinct doctors and procedures for treating children vs. adults — but the division often stops there. People ages 65 and older are largely lumped into the category of geriatric, without considering the vast differences between those in their late 60s or 70s and those in their 80s or 90s.

The prospect of aging can conjure up a multitude of horrors — a mind stolen by dementia, a body debilitated by illness, a soul crushed by social isolation. For most, fear of falling would be well down the list.But falls are, in fact, one of the more common and consequential risks faced by older adults. The statistics, compiled by the Centers for Disease Control, are both eye-opening and alarming.One out of four Americans 65 or older falls at least once every year. Every 11 seconds, an older adult in the U.S. is treated in an emergency room for a fall; every 19 minutes, one dies from a fall. By 2020, the financial cost related to falls by older adults in the U.S. is expected to top $67 billion per year.

Two new, large studies found that people who drank even a single cup of coffee a day lived longer than people who didn’t drink any coffee. [Photo credit: Adobe Stock][/caption]Two recent large studies suggest it might have been coffee that bubbled from the fountain of youth.Both studies, one conducted in the United States, one across 10 European countries, found that people who drank even a single cup of coffee a day — decaf and/or caffeinated — lived longer than people who didn’t drink any coffee.