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MAY 8, 2013 MID RIVERS NEWSMAGAZINE
@MIDRIVERSNEWS NEWSMAGAZINENETWORK.COM
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An estimated 70 percent of Americans will need long-term care after age 65, but most adults underestimate what it will cost and are not taking steps to prepare for their future needs.
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4/23/13 6:34 PM
Adults in denial about long-term care A major new survey reveals important information about American adults’ attitudes on long-term care. The Chicago-headquartered Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research has made available survey results indicating that while Americans aged 40 and older claim to be concerned about needing long-term care down the road, they are not doing much to prepare for it. “It is estimated that 70 percent of Americans who reach the age of 65 will need some form of long-term care for an average of three years each,” Trevor Tompson, director of the AP-NORC Center, said in a news release. “The rapidly aging population brings with it important social and public policy questions about preparing for and providing quality long-term care. This survey establishes what Americans 40 and over understand about the need for longterm care and reveals troubling facts about what is being done to prepare for it.” The survey revealed the following key issues: • There are widespread misperceptions of the cost of long-term care, with most underestimating the cost of nursing home care and overestimating what Medicare will cover. • Nearly one-third of older Americans would rather not think about getting older at all, and when prompted, a majority of them worry about losing their independence. Significant majorities prioritize factors that promote independence as they age,
such as homes with no stairs and living close to family members, health care services, and stores. • While few are setting aside funds to deal with long-term care issues, there is broad concern about key issues of aging such as loss of mental ability, being a burden to family, leaving unpaid debts and being alone without family or friends. • Though Americans aged 40 and older are concerned about issues of aging, only 41 percent have taken the step of talking about long-term care preferences with their families, and only 35 percent have set aside money to pay for long-term care needs. • There is faith in family, with 68 percent of Americans age 40 or older feeling they can rely on their family a great deal or quite a bit in time of need, with another 15 percent saying they can rely on their family for at least a moderate level of support. • There is majority support for public policy options for financing long-term care, with more than 75 percent in favor of tax incentives to encourage saving for longterm care expenses and 51 percent in favor of a government-administered plan. For more information on the survey, visit apnorc.org. Older driver education proves effective Driver retraining improves safe driving habits of older drivers for at least two years, according to recent research. Matthew R. E. Romoser did a follow-up study on elderly drivers aged 70-89 two years after they received training on safe driving behaviors. He compared the drivers who received training to a control group that had not received the training, recording secondary looks, defined as looking away from the immediate path of a vehicle while entering intersections toward regions to the side from which other vehicles could appear. Two years after their training, older drivers in the trained group still took secondary looks on average 73 percent of the time, more than one and a half times as often as pre-training levels. Control group drivers, who averaged secondary looks 41 percent of the time, saw no significant change in performance over the two-year period. “Training in the form of actively practicing target skills in a simulator provides drivers a means by which to reincorporate previously extinguished behaviors into their driving habits,” Remoser said. Older and happier People generally become happier and more pleased with their lives as they age, according to a recent study. Angelina Sutin, a guest researcher at the National Institutes of Health, analyzed data