10/42/397
Speaker dispels myths on aging
By ROY A. JONES II
Senior Staff Writer
An expert on aging told participants in the 16th annual Texas
Joint Conference on Aging he'd rather see people "green and
growing" than "ripe and rotten."
John W. McCue, a retired U.S. Army officer who serves as director
of the Heart of Texas Area Agency on Aging at Waco and as president
of the Texas Association of Area Agencies on Aging, urged workshop
participants to "do all you can to dispel myths about aging
so people can live with dignity."
For instance, wearing glasses and a hearing aid doesn't mean
one is over the hill, he said.
"I've worn glasses since I was 26" - not due to aging
but as result of being "flash-blinded in Vietnam" -
he said, and added that his 14-year-old daughter wears a hearing
aid.
McCue referred to himself as an "empowerment specialist,"
and urged the participants to help the elderly set goals for themselves
and keep their minds and bodies active as health permits.
A recreational jogger, he read some vignettes from a running
magazine that he said inspire him - such as age-group records
set by master runners, some of them over the age of 90.
"I can't wait to get older so I can run faster,"
he quipped.
McCue also listed examples of famous seniors who didn't quit
living at the normal retirement age. They included ageless George
Burns, who won an Academy Award at 81; Golda Meir, who became
Israel's prime minister at 71; George Bernard Shaw, who wrote
his first play at 94; Michaelangelo, who painted the Sistine Chapel
at 71; and Grandma Moses, who started painting at 80 and painted
more than 25 percent of her 1,500 paintings after she turned 100.
Some of the myths on aging McCue sought to dispel were:
-- Children are more likely to support their parents in their
"old age" than their parents are to support them. "Parents
are four times more likely to support their children," he
said.
-- Older people want special treatment. "They want equal
treatment," he said.
-- The learning ability, vocabulary and conceptual skills decrease
with age. "We never stop learning; only 10 percent of seniors
experience any problems with memory loss," he said.
-- Older people are victimized by crime more than any other
age group. "Actually, it is less because they are more cautious,"
McCue said.
"Age isn't a problem; it's a process," he said. "We
start to age before we are born."
In another workshop session, Cheryl Matheis, legislative representative
for the American Association of Retired Persons in Washington,
D.C., gave an overview of the Medicare situation. An AARP attorney
for 11 years, she discussed the options Congress is considering
for long-term solvency of the program and their consequences.
"For Medicare to survive even into the 21st century, changes
must be made now," she said.
She said AARP supports a "two-step approach," which,
she quipped, "is real appropriate since we're in Texas."
The first step is to keep the Medicare Part A Hospital Insurance
Trust Fund fiscally stable for the short-term, she said.
"The second and more challenging step requires a broad
public debate about the direction we want Medicare to take in
the future and about the trade-offs that everyone involved in
Medicare - beneficiaries, hospitals, doctors and other health
care professionals - will have to make in order to keep the program
strong," she said.
President Clinton's budget proposes to reduce Medicare spending
by $100 billion between 1999-2002, with a portion of the savings
being used to shore up the Hospital Insurance Trust Fund, she
said.
But one of the major proposals - reducing the annual fee paid
to hospitals for each Medicare patient - "could lead to the
closure of hospitals and/or impede beneficiary access to care,"
she said.
Today's final day of the four-day conference will begin with
an 8:30 a.m. address by Texas Attorney General Dan Morales. His
office has received awards from the U.S. Department of Health
and Human Services for Medicaid fraud control.
Send a Letter to the Editor about This
Story | Start or Join A Discussion about This Story
Send the URL (Address) of This Story
to A Friend:
Copyright ©1997,
Abilene Reporter-News / Texnews / E.W. Scripps Publications
|
