Age Differences, Age Changes, and Generalizability in Marathon Running by Master Athletes.

This study examines the world's Top 100 age class performance times by Master athletes in marathon running. The predominant paradigm for this type of research assumes that the outcomes represent a "virtual" cross-sectional study with important implications about aging. This article critiques this perspective and presents alternative models that include temporal dimensions that relate to cohort differences, age changes and historical transitions.

Aging and Half-Ironman Performance.

Unlabelled: Background/Study Context: Previous research on triathlon performance analyzed age trends for the Top Ten or Top Five finishers in world championship or national races at Olympic, Half-Ironman, and Ironman distances. The findings indicated higher age declines and/or earlier onset of decline in swimming and running than cycling. However, the designs of those studies took no account of possible differences between cross-sectional and longitudinal trends (i.

Subjective Well-Being In Later Life: 20 years after the Butterworths monograph series on individual and population aging.

This article discusses developments in theory and research on happiness two decades after publication of Psychological Well-Being in Later Life (Butterworths, 1991) by Albert Kozma, Michael Stones, and Kevin McNeil. Major empirical advances include new knowledge about contributions to happiness resulting from genetically related effects and personality. Personality traits have stronger relationships with happiness than was apparent 20 years ago and contribute to covariance between happiness and some of its predictors.

Senior-friendly emergency department care: an environmental assessment.

Objectives: to assess the environment of an emergency department (ED) and its impact on care of adults aged 75 and over, using a 'senior-friendly' conceptual framework that included the physical environment, social climate, hospital policies and procedures, and wider health care system.

Methods: in this focused ethnography, we collected and analysed data from the ED of a regional acute care hospital located in Ontario, Canada from October 2007 to January 2008. Data collection included interviews with seniors or their proxy decision-makers, staff and key community informants; on-site observations; a staff survey; and hospital administrative data.

Payment for participation in research: a pursuit for the poor?

Poor people predominate as a subgroup of those who take part in healthy volunteer research. They are subjected to minimised but unknown risks and unpleasant burdens so that the safety of new medicines can be evaluated. This is prima facie unfair especially given that the poor are often unable to access expensive medicines.

Predictors of a new depression diagnosis among older adults admitted to complex continuing care: implications for the depression rating scale (DRS).

Background: depression is a major disabling condition among older adults, where it may be under-diagnosed for a number of reasons, including a different presentation for younger people with depression. The Minimum Data Set 2.0 (MDS 2.

Examination of the relationship among hearing impairment, linguistic communication, mood, and social engagement of residents in complex continuing-care facilities.

Unlabelled: Earlier evidence was not conclusive about whether hearing loss is associated with mood (i.e., depressive symptoms and anhedonia) and social engagement (i.

Predicting diagnosed depression and anti-depressant treatment in institutionalized older adults by symptom profiles: a closer look at anhedonia and dysphoria.

The purpose of this study was to examine the relationships of diagnosis and treatment of depression with anhedonic and dysphoric symptom presentation, using the Minimum Data Set 2.0. Participants were from two sectors of longterm care: 70 nursing home residents and 92 residents in a Veterans' Care Service.

Measuring depression in nursing home residents with the MDS and GDS: an observational psychometric study.

Background: The objective of this study was to examine the Minimum Data Set (MDS) and Geriatric Depression Scale (GDS) as measures of depression among nursing home residents.

Methods: The data for this study were baseline, pre-intervention assessment data from a research study involving nine nursing homes and 704 residents in Massachusetts. Trained research nurses assessed residents using the MDS and the GDS 15-item version.

The independent contribution of driver, crash, and vehicle characteristics to driver fatalities.

Several driver, crash, and vehicle characteristics may affect the fatality risk of drivers involved in crashes. To determine the independent contribution of these variables to drivers' fatality risk, we used data from single-vehicle crashes with fixed objects contained in the US Fatal Accident Reporting System. A multivariate logistic regression revealed that the odds ratio (OR) of a fatal injury increased with age, reaching 4.

Traffic-related fatalities among older drivers and passengers: past and future trends.

Purpose Of The Study: This study was initiated to forecast the number of older drivers and passengers who may be fatally injured in traffic crashes in future years.

Design And Methods: The study was based on data from the U.S.

Burden in caregivers of cognitively impaired older adults living in the community: methodological issues and determinants.

Considerable burden is reported by informal caregivers of older individuals with cognitive impairment. Significant progress in the understanding of determinants of this burden has been achieved. However, further progress could be attained if we considered important methodological issues that may have limited our understanding of caregiver burden.

Development of delirium: a prospective cohort study in a community hospital.

Background: Previous research on risk of delirium in acute hospital settings identified mainly patient variables (e.g., age) that are not amenable to intervention.

Integrated health information systems based on the RAI/MDS series of instruments.

There is a growing need for an integrated health information system to be used in community, institutional and hospital based settings. For example, changes in the structure, process and venues of service delivery mean that individuals with similar needs may be cared for in a variety of different settings. Moreover, as people make transitions from one sector of the healthcare system to another, there is a need for comparable information to ensure continuity of care and reduced assessment burden.

Predicting caregiver burden and depression in Alzheimer's disease.

Objectives: The purpose of this study was to investigate the predictors of caregiver burden and depression, including objective stressors and mediation forces influencing caregiving outcomes.

Methods: This investigation is based on the 1994 Canadian Study of Health and Aging (CSHA) database. Participants were 613 individuals with dementia, living in either the community or an institution, and their informal caregivers.

1997 IPA/Bayer Research Awards in Psychogeriatrics. Associations between dysfunctional behaviors, gender, and burden in spousal caregivers of cognitively impaired older adults.

Reductions in healthcare spending and current demographic trends will result in increasing demands to care for aging relatives, especially those with cognitive impairment (e.g., Alzheimer's disease).

Smoke without fire: a reply to Hardy, Segatore and Edge.

Literacy is defined in the Oxford English Dictionary as the ability to read and write, and illiteracy as an inability to read. Hardy, Segatore and Edge (1993) suggest a serious problem of illiteracy among student nurses that endangers patient safety. Their evidence is entirely anecdotal, some of which is misclassified as literacy errors.

Acute exercise facilitates semantically cued memory in nursing home residents.

Objective: To study the acute effects of non-strenuous physical exercise on memory retrieval and visuo-motor performance in old-old nursing home residents.

Design: A randomized control trial.

Setting: A nursing home.

Age, activity, and physical performance: an evaluation of performance models.

Two performance models relating age, physical activity, and physical performance were evaluated on 5 age cohorts involving more than 6,000 persons ranging in age from 20 to 69 years. Significant age and activity main effects, without 1 Age X Activity interaction, were obtained on 5 fitness measures and 2 activity indexes. These results are inconsistent with predictions from the moderation model, but they fit predictions from a recently formulated tonic and overpractice model of physical performance.

A controlled evaluation of reminiscence and current topics discussion groups in a nursing home context.

In this randomized study, we compared the psychological well-being of elderly nursing home residents who participated in reminiscence and current topics group discussions with a control group of residents. We rated participants happiness/depression, activity, mood, and functional levels before and after the group interventions. The intervention had a significant effect only on the happiness/depression measure, with both intervention groups showing positive changes compared to the control group.