The older adult population has grown significantly which, in turn, increases the awareness of healthy ageing. Through this new found awareness, facilitators and barriers to healthy ageing were identified and explored. No factor related to aging is solitary, as all factors influence one another. To begin, taking care of the self “…maintains structural integrity and human functioning and contributes to human development.” (Gilbert et al., 2012, p. 22). The self includes both the physical and emotional beings of an individual. Human development is applicable to all ages and it is vital for older adults to have a sense of growth, function and integrity. Consequences for lack of self-care is a deteriorating ageing process. Ageing is inevitable, …show more content…
To facilitate in healthy ageing, elderly persons must not give in or give up, as it upholds the organization and meaning, and function in their lives.
Older adults need to maintain a sense of meaning and integrity. Whether they reside at home or in the hospital, activities and social gatherings are vital for healthy ageing. Nurses should encourage patients to socialize by having them sit in the dining area with other patients, opposed to eating alone in their room. If the patient is self-conscious about how they eat, adjustments can be made such as, using a plate with a “lip” or a raised rim. These plates help patients to help put food onto utensils and reduce food spillage. Furthermore, to aid in the ageing process, nurses must adjust the teaching process to fit the needs and constraints of older adulthood. For example, the nurse should allow more time for teaching sessions and reduce amount of movement needed by the patient. Age changes but does not obstruct the learning of new information.
The teaching-learning process is more than educating a patient about a new skill. It’s a “co-created caring relationship that promotes knowledge, growth, empowerment and healing processes and possibilities for patients (others) and for self” (Watson, 2014). In other words, it’s a transpersonal process. To effectively demonstrate transpersonal teaching, nurses must recognize the
More people are living much longer lives than in years past. People are very surprised to be living much longer lives than they thought they would. Health care has played a large part in patient longevity. There are many normal changes that come along with aging, however, because people are living longer these normal changes can become chronic problems. Common aging problems that can make the older adult a vulnerable population are reviewed in Gerontological Nursing (Tabloski, 2014) and can include nutritional needs, medication management, sleep changes, oral or mouth care, renal problems and musculoskeletal concerns. According to A Profile of Older Americans: 2013 (http://www.hhs.gov), there are a large amount
One of the key arguments for mental health being the important factor in successful aging is a person’s self-perception about aging (SPA) (Monko, 2016). Specifically, that SPA has a bearing on disease progression and perceived quality of life (Monko, 2016). That is, the higher the SPA, the more positive the sense of well-being,
The humanity of aging is a concept sometimes hard to grasp. Understanding why we are
With the advances in medical care, better health practices, improved nutrition, and other factors help people live longer. As long as older adults are following the correct measures, they can help counter the effects of aging because this stage here most people retire, they need to stay active and keep eating healthy foods. By not living actively can lead to his or her body shutting down, and may also lead to an early death. Many programs are available that older adults can join to
Aging is a universal phenomenon and humans are no exception. Gerontology deals with the psychological, social and biological aspects of aging process. A recent study shows that people aged 85 years and older are expected to augment from 5.3 million people to 21 million as the world reach 2050. In today’s world Gerontology has an enormous role to play so that the senior citizens could be analyzed and their needs may be addressed with compassion and empathy.
Reminiscing to 2010, when I was faced with my grandmother 's illness during the adolescent years in my life I knew that I had a passion to care for the elderly (aging) population. From this passion, it ignited a fire so strong that I pursue my certified nursing assistant certification to gain a better understanding of working with the elderly population. By doing so, it has been a great benefit to my life; aging is an inevitable experience that we all will go through during our life. It is important to ensure that our elderly individuals are still able to enjoy the best quality of life after retirement. However, as we age, there will be a lifestyle change that the aging population must encounter.
After spending an afternoon interviewing my elderly father-in-law, I gained insight into how he perceives the aging process and the impact on the quality of his life. First, and foremost he viewed aging in a very positive and healthy manner. He believes that a positive attitude assists in accepting physical and psychosocial changes and enjoyed the fact that he and his wife are both physically fit and cognitively alert. He felt confident that advances made in health care and the quality of their lives would continue to be empowering. He enjoys the benefits of being a senior citizen including discounted travel, free education, and other incentives marketed towards seniors. He expressed a sense of well-being with respect to the numerous
Aging is very complex and highly individualized process which begins at conception and end with death. Variables such as physical or cognitive impairments, socioeconomic aspect, cultural values, and beliefs make an aging process unique to each individual. I interviewed an elderly woman using a set of guided questionnaires on the topic to further explore her aging experience. For the purpose of this assignment, I will refer to the client interviewed as a D.L., a changed name for a reason of privacy and confidentiality. During the interview, we explored a D.L. strategy to stay healthy, significant accomplishments of her life, hobbies and activities, retirement, and finally the goals for the future.
Aging is a summary term of complex biological processes that occurs over the course of life. As an individual age’s, they experience a cognitive, functional and social decline that affects their activities of daily living and general health. As a result of these changes, the older population becomes more susceptible to a variety of illnesses. However, nurses can lessen the severity of these aging related illnesses by teaching and providing the best care for their clients in order to decrease the number of elders that suffer from these diseases through a variety of interventions and strategies. The purpose of this paper is to reflect on the nurses’ role in promoting healthy aging in the older population, by addressing a significant issue that impairs the health of many older Canadian adults.
People lose height, skin becomes loose, hair becomes gray, people become covered in wrinkles and they start to become weak. Even though all of this may be true, older people still have purpose in life. Patients often feel stripped from their life from dementia. “Richard Leider, one of America's preeminent executive life coaches and renowned expert on purpose and meaning in life, has postulated that purpose is fundamental to an individual's health, happiness, and longevity”(Nakonetschny). With conducting activities into nursing homes, that sense of happiness and meaning will become reestablished more and more every day. Dementia patients have family that cares for them and wishes the best for them, they do not wish to see their relatives rot away in a nursing
As the year’s progress, so will the age demographic, shifting the number of elderly and their life span higher than it’s ever been seen in history. With that being said, the course material has revealed many aspects that will shift the experience of aging in a whole new way, because after all we are all in this together. Although, these things might not matter now they will matter in the future and being aware, having a plan, thinking and implementing these ideas early in life will have a dramatic effect on the outcome and the way one will live later on. However, situating a better environment not only comes from the person but from those that surround them, not just from family and loved ones, but improving and finding solutions that are evident
Successful aging is a complicated and multifaceted concept that varies contextually among individuals, disciplines, and even time. Gerontologists have traditionally considered a person to have aged successfully upon having reached old age with their physical health, mental well-being and spirit still intact. Ultimately, successful aging is a matter of personal perspective, largely influenced by an individual 's values and experiences. Even those within America 's elderly population hold conflicting perspectives on what it means to have aged successfully. A qualitative study published by Reichstadt and Sengupta titled Older Adults ' Perspectives on Successful Aging, concluded that “older adults viewed successful aging as a balance between self-acceptance and self-contentedness on one hand and engagement with life and self-growth in later life on the other” (Reichstadt, "Older Adults ' Perspectives on Successful Aging: Qualitative Interviews", pp. 567-575.)
Aging can be a scary thing for many individuals. Aging can bring on fears of losing quality of life, becoming ill or disabled, losing mental capabilities, and not being able to care for one’s self, and many other issues. Some of these issues can be addressed by changing ways of thinking or finding new ways to do old things. The article THE POTENTIAL OF OLDER ADULTS TO ENHANCE COMMUNITY QUALITY OF LIFE: LINKS BETWEEN POSITIVE PSYCHOLOGY AND PRODUCTIVE AGING can give people hope that some aspects of aging and quality of life are in the control of the individual who is aging.
Aging and being old was dominated by negative characteristics and conditions such as illness, depression, and isolation for a long time (Eibach, Mock, & Courtney, 2010). At first glance the terms “success” and “aging” seem to be in conflict to each other. When asking people about aging, their answers have many facets that are also found in psychological definitions: successful aging is seen as health, maturity and personal growth, self-acceptance, happiness, generativity, coping, and acceptance of age-related limitations. In the psychological sense successful aging is also often seen as the absence of age-associated characteristics (Strawbridge, Wallhagen, & Cohen, 2002). It seems that successful aging means is not aging.
As a support worker, I have noticed in my care practice with elderly people, that every single older person is unique and needs an individual approach, therefore day to day life and well-being issues are often a matter of degree; an older person may be able to dress himself or herself except for reaching to put on shoes and tie shoelaces, or managing difficult fasteners (especially zippers and snaps that close in the back). If that is the case, self-care abilities can be improved simply by changing the kinds of clothes worn and the way they are fastened. One person may be able to eat independently except for cutting foods or handling liquids without spilling them. At the other extreme, another person may not be able to bring a spoon to his or her mouth at all, or may even have difficulty swallowing food.