T H E N E W S L E T T E R O F T H E U F I N S T I T U T E O N A G I N G | FA L L 2015 | W W W. A G I N G . U F L . E D U
WELCOME, DR. OTTO AND DR. XIAO This fall, we welcomed two new faculty members to the Institute on Aging. Rui Xiao, Ph.D., is an assistant professor in the department of aging and geriatric research’s division of biology of aging. His research involves examining the genetic proesses that modify animal aging. He recently identified a novel genetic pathway implicated in cold-promoted longevity in C. elegans, a nematode. Xiao comes to the department from the Life Sciences Institute at the University of Michigan, where he was a postdoctoral fellow. He completed his Ph.D. at Ohio State University in Columbus.
Mallory Otto, M.D.
Rui Xiao, Ph.D.
Mallory Otto, M.D., is the newest geriatrician to join our staff. An assistant clinical professor and geriatric medicine co-clerkship director, Otto provides geriatric consultation as part of the embedded geriatrician model of care at UF Health Shands Hospital. Otto works in the trauma service in the surgical intensive care unit, providing advice to the unit on the care of older adults and on the management of problems that can arise from hospitalization, such as confusion in the hospital and loss of function. Prior to her appointment at UF Health, Otto completed medical school at Weill Cornell Medical College, internal medicine training at NewYork-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell Medical Center and a geriatric medicine fellowship at Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai Hospital, all in in New York City.
FISH OIL TO ENRGISE? Researchers know that low-grade chronic inflammation is a risk factor for disability, impaired mobility and lower walking speed. But researchers don’t know whether interventions that reduce inflammation improve mobility or avert its decline in older adults. In the pilot study Enabling Reduction of Low-Grade Inflammation in Seniors, or ENRGISE, our goal is to test whether fish oil and the blood pressure drug losartan, which have been shown to lower inflammation, could help improve physical function.
CONGRATULATIONS, DR. COHEN! The Evelyn F. and William L. McKnight Brain Institute of the University of Florida and the UF Institute on Aging are pleased to announce the formation of a newly endowed chair, the Evelyn F. McKnight chair for clinical translational research in cognitive aging and memory. Ronald Cohen, Ph.D., director of the Cognitive Aging and Memory Clinical Translational Research Program, or the CAM-CTRP, and a professor of aging and geriatric research, neurology and psychiatry, has been named the inaugural endowed chair. Cohen’s new chair is funded by an endowment from the McKnight Brain Research Foundation. The mission of the CAM-CTRP is to advance understanding of normal cognitive aging, including brain changes that occur with advanced age. “Some cognitive functions tend to change with age, such as information processing speed, working memory and certain aspects of executive control,” Cohen said. “The neural bases for these changes are not well-understood.”
Ronald Cohen, Ph.D.
Cohen’s research focuses on discovering ways of delaying or improving function during normal cognitive aging — cognitive decline not caused by disease.
EVALUATING OUR BOOT CAMP This multicenter trial is funded by a cooperative agreement grant, U01AG050499, from the National Institute on Aging totaling $5.3 million. The principal investigators are IOA director Marco Pahor, M.D., and Walter Ambrosius, Ph.D., at Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center, and the participating sites include University of Florida, Northwestern University, University of Pittsburgh, Tufts University, University of Vermont and Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center.
Since 2014, the IOA and the department of aging and geriatric research has hosted three geriatric care boot camps that have educated more than 100 health care professionals from different disciplines. Led by UF bioethicist Lauren Solberg, J.D., M.T.S., these sessions covered core concepts such as delirium and dementia, medication management, palliative care, the ethics of care for older adults and care of older patients in the hospital. We will hold a fourth boot camp this fall on caring for older patients as they transition from hospital to home or other facilities.
Recently, we published a paper in the Journal of the American Geriatrics Society reporting on the 44 attendees who were surveyed immediately before and after the first boot camp, and then three months later. Following the event, attendees reported being more knowledgeable and comfortable caring for older adults. Of the half of participants who responded to the followup, the majority said they used the knowledge they gained — especially information they learned about delirium and dementia — and shared that knowledge with students, nurses and patient families.
Christy Carter, Ph.D., an assistant professor in the department of aging and geriatric research; Laurence Solberg, M.D., chief of the division of geriatric medicine as well as division chief of career development and education, and Lauren Solberg, J.D., M.T.S., an assistant professor in the department of community health and family medicine, co-authored the paper.