SENIOR HIGH

Senior High
Ed Johnson June 2009

With the increasing focus on fixing the medical system in America. A hidden problem goes on notice quietly affecting the life’s of families Globally and across the United States and costing insurers, employers, and employees dollars.

The problem is the growing number of overly medicated elderly– basically walking around legally high. Mostly at the expense of the taxpayer. The real rub is the cycle of hospitalization, injury, misdiagnoses, degeneration of cognitive functioning and problematic dependency on drugs.

How did we get to this disturbing place? There are several independent – profit and ego driven contributors to this mess.

1.Big pharmaceutical companies direct marketing of solution drugs.
2.Buy in of Medical providers of Pharma incentives to push targeted pharmaceuticals.
3.Culture of fixing short term symptoms (take two and call me in the morning)
4. Public by-in of the power of science to fix all ills with low risk and minimal complications.
5.Large population of the already addicted returning home from the Vietnam and Korean conflicts
6.Cost savings pressures to free up bed space and reduce fiscal responsibilities.
7.Decrease in the time, space and place for seniors to engage in meaningful activities.
8.Lack of a National registry to coordinate/ monitor medications

Geriatric Specialist – Joel S. Ross, MD, FACP, AGSF, CMD stated in his article: The value of a geriatric consultation ;
“As Medicare recipients can see as many physicians as they feel necessary, they frequent the specialists” again and again, with the result often of many medications prescribed with little time to explain the potential dangers of drug toxicity/side effects.”
(. . . specialists were seen without the knowledge/endorsement/referral by – primary care physician)
Americans consume over 50% of all prescription medications used in the entire world.

6 March, 2009 MEDIA RELEASE
SENIORS ARE OVER-MEDICATED, UNDER-EXERCISED: CHIROPRACTORS
SENIORS are often over-medicated and under-exercised and are needlessly over-burdening
our current health care system, according to the Chiropractors’ Association of Australia
(NSW) President, Mr Bryce Conrad.
This week’s NSW Seniors Week (15 – 22 March, 2009) highlights the need for seniors to be
made aware of preventative health treatments that can help improve their quality of life,
reduce their need for medication and help cut the cost burden on our health care system

UCLA researcher Dominick Frosch analyzed prescription drug commercials aired in 2004 and found —Surprise! — Madison Avenue baloney, not facts, dominated.
Ninety percent of the ads studied portrayed actors far happier after they took the advertised drug, most with no mention of causes, risk factors, prevalence of the disease, alternatives like exercise, diet, or cheaper over-the-counter medications of equal effect.
Typical is the 30-second spot in which a desolate urban-dweller enters a doctor’s office, is prescribed a cholesterol-lowering drug, then exits into sunny suburbia to the delight of his loved ones and neighbors. Hallelujah!

In other words, most consumer drug advertising is hogwash.
Little wonder all the advanced countries on earth ban such bull, except New Zealand and the United States.
Instead of relying on drugs as your first option, consider them your last.

Finally, stop believing in the magic of pills. Talk to your doctor about alternatives for each and every pill you take: diet, exercise, less powerful medications.
Consider, too, that today drug makers, doctors, and patients all are quick to medicate conditions once accepted simply as part of the human condition.

Over-medicated in America
Nancy Riggs: August 13, 2008
Many American’s are not aware of the dangers of prescription drug use, or over-the-counter drug abuse, especially if they are abusing them. The reason for the lack of concern is that many American’s think that drugs you can get without a prescription have got to be safe, and for prescription drugs they just trust their doctors judgment, regarding them as a highly trained professional, however, “those who trust there physician’s judgment about how well drugs work often do not realize how often a doctor-no matter how observant and experienced-simply cant tell. But should we as patients be so trusting, when the pharmaceutical company may be affecting our doctor’s decisions? “Well over 125,000 American’s die from drug reactions and mistakes each year, that could make pharmaceuticals the fourth-leading national cause of death after heart disease, cancer and stroke”(America land of the medicated)

Works from Nancy Riggs Article:

Moore, T (1995). Deadly Medicine. New York, New York: Simon & Schuster.

Facklam, H (1996). Alternative medicine cure or myths. New York, New York: Twenty-First Century Books.

Diller, L (1998). Running on Ritalin. New York, New York: A Bantum Book.

Mindell, E (1998). Prescription Alternatives. Lincolnwood, Illinois: Keats.

The Toronto Star
November 11, 2008 Tuesday
NEWS; Pg. A01
Drugged-out seniors a prescription for disaster
Judy Steed Special to the star, Special to the star

They are the drugged-out generation, and they’re not who you think they are.
They’re 80. And 85 and 90 and 95 – over-medicated seniors clogging emergency departments, blocking hospital beds and sicker than they have any reason to be.
The Number 1 drug users in North America, outside of patients in long-term care facilities, are women over the age of 65. Twelve per cent are on 10 or more meds, sometimes up to 20 or more drugs; 23 per cent take at least five drugs. In long-term care, seniors are on six to eight medications, on average.
Fifteen per cent of seniors admitted to hospital are suffering drug side effects. It’s not uncommon to find seniors dizzy and dotty from being prescribed so many drugs.
“You’d fall down, too, if you were on so many drugs,” says Dr. William Dalziel, a prominent Ottawa geriatrician.

One of the reasons overmedication is such a serious issue, apart from the biological aspects, is that seniors become vulnerable to serious falls when they’re excessively drugged, and serious falls can lead to a downward spiral of hospitalization, extreme fear of going out, isolation and death. As well, many seniors have trouble sleeping; instead of being encouraged to tire themselves out with exercise and activities, they may become habituated to sleeping pills that leave them groggy during the day.
Another problem, says Dr. Paula Rochon, a Baycrest geriatrician, is that doses for older people should often be much lower than for younger people. She notes that Valium is long acting and very sedating and shouldn’t be prescribed at all to seniors.
Not only does overmedication cost the health-care system millions of dollars annually in unnecessary, expensive prescriptions, but also the entire system slows down – and wait times for other patients lengthen – as emergency departments and hospitals struggle to diagnose drug-related problems.
In 1995, the Canadian Medical Association Journal found that doctors who wrote the most prescriptions also had the highest death rates among their patients.
“This study found that some doctors, in trying to maximize the number of patients they could process per day, did not take the time necessary to find out what was wrong with these patients,” writes David Foot in his bestseller, Boom, Bust & Echo. “That kind of medical practice results in overmedicated and inappropriately medicated patients.”
According to Dr. Jerry Gurwitz, chief of geriatric medicine at the University of Massachusetts Medical School: “Any new symptom in an older person should be considered a drug side effect until proven otherwise.”
“When you’re dealing with complex conditions (in seniors) and all these drugs, how do doctors make the right choices?” she asks. “It gets complicated for everybody.”
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I am sure that there are enough injuries, deaths, hospitalizations and misdiagnoses to support efforts like a Brown Bag Check-up. Brown Bag Check-up is when you gather all of your current medications and over-the-counter products into a “brown-bag” and show them to your doctor or pharmacist so he/she can look for any potential problems.
http://www.ismp.org/Newsletters/consumer/alerts/BrownBag.asp

Same Road Different Map!

With our shaken confidence in investments, retirement instruments and the financial industry — we are faced with the necessity to save and accumulate more for an uncertain future.

Recent reports from ” . . . LANSING, Mich., June 19 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ — A new study released in the American Journal of Medicine http://pnhp.org/new_bankruptcy_study/Bankruptcy-2009.pdf, reported that bankruptcies due to medical debt rose 50% from 2001 to 2007. Elder Law of Michigan experienced a similar rise in the calls for help from older adults who are desperate for relief from high debt accumulated from family illnesses. It is a critical short term problem, but for people approaching or in retirement, the situation is devastating. The combination of lost jobs, premature forced retirement, diminished returns on investments for retirement and the personal and economic pain of bankruptcy wipes out security in retirement and forces many from the middle class into a grueling struggle to maintain their homes and stay independent.”

Experience speaks loudly … the retirees with solid investments in Ford and GM got socked with and stuck with holding a stack of worthless ( well almost worthless ) bonds and stock.

So do we blindly act on what is reasonably foreseeable?
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The later years are going to cost more and we will live longer and our investments may not be enough combined with an uncertain market-place. In addition, we might need to provide support to our not so young parents who are navigating all of the above.

1. Save more in increasingly diversified ways. ( different classes of investments -in different accounts; different maturities: different levels of risk)
2. Tax impacts some taxable some non-taxable Roth IRA’s and other estate protecting instruments.
3. Learn and be aware of the changing investment and retirement landscape.
4. Consider long-term care options now (Not just for your parents, but for you.)
5. Be Health aware now. The better shape you are in the less it will cost you to stay that way.

The need to boost our savings and manage our future has never been greater !
What strategies are you willing to employ?

Moving to an other world country: South America, Mexico to gain from the lower cost of living.

Finding resources before your eye-sight starts to go. Watching the not-so-young attempt to navigate the ever changing medical and retirement environment has been eye opening.
While you have the stamina and focus to go through: voice mail menus, state ad federal agencies like medicare, insurance providers and don’t forget paperwork and supplemental support programs.

Start a systematic approach:
Where do I want to be when I am 83; notice I did not say when I am retired. Is my house or residence set up for easy access lower cabinets, safety rails, wider door ways and fewer to no stairs. What medical providers are there and do they accept my insurance ( wait do I have insurance?). Look at it this way what might be difficult now, could turn out to be impossible to do at later stages of your life. Who wants to hear that.

More later