Improving and Extending Quality of Life Among Older Americans (part 3)

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CDC

CDC’s Roles in Promoting Healthy Aging
CDC’s Healthy Aging Program conducts activities designed to provide a comprehensive approach to helping older adults live longer, high-quality, productive, and independent lives. The Healthy Aging Program collaborates with other CDC programs, such as those focused on injury prevention, disability prevention, and adult immunizations, as well as with key external groups.

Examples of these activities include the following:

•Enhance the ability of states and communities to identify and implement effective strategies, policies, and programs to promote and protect the health of older adults. CDC supports the Healthy Aging Research Network (HAN), a consortium of nine Prevention Research Centers at academic institutions around the country working to better understand the determinants of healthy aging, identify interventions that promote healthy aging, and assist in translating research into sustainable community-based programs.

In 2008, the Healthy Aging Program sponsored “Effective Programs to Treat Depression in Older Adults: Implementation Strategies for Community Agencies,” a symposium to assist community-based professionals in public health, aging services, and mental health networks in providing science-based depression screening and management for older adults.

In 2009, a second symposium, “Promoting Environmental and Policy Change to Support Healthy Aging,” will address the opportunities posed by environmental and policy strategies.

The Healthy Aging Program recently released Assuring Healthy Caregivers, A Public Health Approach to Translating Research into Practice: The RE-AIM Framework, to respond to challenges in translating science-based caregiver interventions into “real world” settings. This document helps practitioners and researchers plan, conduct, and evaluate intervention programs and policies that promote the health and well-being of caregivers. It also illustrates the benefits of applying the RE-AIM framework (Reach, Effectiveness, Adoption, Implementation, and Maintenance) to caregiver intervention programs, using Alabama’s REACH (Resources for Enhancing Caregiver Health) II Caregiver Demonstration Project as an example.

Improving and Extending Quality of Life Among Older Americans (part 2)

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CDC

Critical Opportunities To Improve Older Adults' Health and Quality of Life
Our increased understanding of the critical factors involved in protecting and promoting the health of older adults has identified emerging public health issues that need to be addressed, such as the following:

•Promote an up-to-date measure for clinical preventive services. Population-based data on the use of preventive services recommended for older adults, such as immunizations and regular health screenings, are currently monitored individually. A composite measure would better promote the services, improve data collection, and more effectively guide policy.

•Address depression. Depression affects nearly 7 million older adults, but many do not receive treatment. Community-based strategies to effectively screen and treat older adults should be more widely disseminated.

•Promote caregiving interventions. In 2004, about 34 million people were providing unpaid care for adult family members, friends, or neighbors aged 50 years or older. This number will increase dramatically as baby boomers reach older age. A key public health goal is to translate policies and strategies known to improve caregiver health and well-being into widespread practice.

•Address end-of-life issues. What most people want at the end of their lives is well-documented—to die, as pain-free as possible, at home with family present and to have their wishes honored. However, many people are not allowed “to die with dignity.” In response, public health aims to raise awareness about the value of end-of-life planning and ensure that individuals and their families have appropriate guidance and information.

Improving and Extending Quality of Life Among Older Americans

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The Health and Economic Effects of an Aging Society
By 2030, the number of U.S. adults aged 65 years or older will more than double to about 71 million. The rapidly increasing number and diversity of older Americans has far-reaching implications for the U.S. public health system and will place unprecedented demands on aging services and the nation’s entire health care system.

For example, Medicare spending has grown about nine-fold in the past 25 years, increasing from $37 billion in 1980 to $336 billion in 2005. If left unchecked, health care spending will increase 25% by 2030, largely because of the aging population.

Chronic diseases disproportionately affect older adults and are associated with disability, diminished quality of life, and increased costs for health care and long-term care. Today, about 80% of older adults have at least one chronic condition, and 50% have at least two. These conditions can cause years of pain and loss of function. Public health efforts can help Americans avoid preventable illness and disability as they age. Research has shown that poor health is not an inevitable consequence of aging. Effective public health strategies currently exist to help older adults remain independent longer, improve their quality of life, and potentially delay the need for long-term care.
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Nutrient 'Cocktail' Appears to Improve Dementia Symptoms

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MedicineNet
-- A combination of three nutrients might help improve memory in Alzheimer's patients by stimulating the growth of new brain connections (synapses), a new study shows.

Uridine, choline and the omega-3 fatty acid DHA (all found in breast milk) are precursors to the fatty molecules that make up brain cell membranes, which form synapses.

"If you can increase the number of synapses by enhancing their production, you might to some extent avoid that loss of cognitive ability" that occurs in Alzheimer's patients, Richard Wurtman, a professor of brain and cognitive sciences at MIT, said in a news release. He conducted the basic research that led to this investigational treatment.

In a clinical trial, 225 Alzheimer's patients were given a cocktail of the three nutrients, along with B vitamins, phosopholipids and antioxidants. Patients with mild Alzheimer's showed improvements in verbal memory.

The study was published Jan. 8 in the journal Alzheimer's and Dementia.

Three additional clinical trials are underway in the United States and Europe. Results are expected within a few years.

-- Robert Preidt

Alzheimer's Patients More Likely to Develop Cognitive Fluctuations

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Alzheimer's Patients More Likely to Develop Cognitive Fluctuations

Seniors who are developing, or already suffer from, the dreaded Alzheimer's Disease (AD) are more likely than their peers to suffer disruptions in their train of thought. These events are also known as cognitive fluctuations, and they include such things as sleepiness, staring into nothing, and disorganized or illogical thinking. The conclusion belongs to a new study carried out by experts at the Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis. The team discovered that older people with symptoms of AD tended to exhibit more such episodes than their healthy peers.

“If you have these lapses, they don't by themselves mean that you have Alzheimer's. Such lapses do occur in healthy older adults. But our results suggest that they are something your doctor needs to consider if he or she is evaluating you for problems with thinking and memory,” WUSL neurologist James Galvin, MD, explains.

The expert is based at the Barnes-Jewish Hospital, and is also the senior author of a new paper detailing the findings, which appears in the January 19 issue of the respected scientific journal Neurology.

In previous studies, cognitive fluctuations have been associated with a condition known as dementia with Lewy bodies. However, until the new study came along, there was no clear indication of any possible links between Alzheimer's disease and these mental lapses. “We have some ideas about why the biology of dementia with Lewy bodies causes these mental lapses, but nothing comparable for Alzheimer's. It's possible that some of the patients who were diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease in this study will go on to develop dementia with Lewy bodies, but at the time of the study, they weren't showing any of the Lewy body dementia's core features,” Galvin adds.

The new investigation was conducted on 511 participants. The study group had an average age of 78, and all of the subjects were determined to be experiencing memory problems. The WUSL specialists conducted a thorough survey of the symptoms each of the participants exhibited, by either consulting with the people directly, or by asking family members. The factors they were scanning for included drowsiness or lethargy in spite of sufficient sleep, the incidence of times when the test subjects were thinking in illogical and disorganized patterns, and how often the seniors stared into a single point for prolonged periods of time.

About 12 percent of all respondents were determined to exhibit all these three symptoms, the team reveals in the Neurology paper. The conclusions of the research also showed that people suffering from all three mental lapses were 4.6 times more likely than the others to eventually develop Alzheimer's disease. The work is very important because it also sheds more light on Lewy body dementia. It was shown that the condition could easily overlap with AD and Parkinson's, and the new approach to analyzing these correlations may result in novel therapy and drugs to fight dementia.

Secondhand Smoke Linked to Adult Cognitive Impairment ( part 2 )

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By John Gever, Senior Editor, MedPage Today
Reviewed by Robert Jasmer, MD; Associate Clinical Professor of Medicine, University of California, San Francisco . Earn CME/CE credit
for reading medical news

CAMBRIDGE, England,

Dr. Llewellyn and colleagues said earlier research had found an association between passive smoking and the risk of developing dementia, but those findings failed to reach statistical significance after adjusting for age, sex, and education. (See: AAN: Secondhand Smoke Can Add to Dementia Risk)


The researchers said the cognitive impairments seemingly associated with passive smoking may originate with the well-known vascular effects of tobacco. Over a long period, these effects could "compromise the blood supply to the brain," they wrote.


Arguing against that hypothesis was a finding in the current study that the presence or absence of cardiovascular disease, did not affect the results. Nevertheless, said Dr. Llewellyn and colleagues, "exposure to secondhand smoke may interact with subclinical cardiovascular disease."


In an accompanying editorial, Mark D. Eisner, M.D., M.P.H., of the University of California San Francisco, agreed that the study was additional evidence that secondhand smoke can impair brain function.


He also echoed the researchers' call for prospective studies, noting that cotinine was a marker only of tobacco exposure within the last day or so of sampling.


"Although recent exposure probably correlates with longer term exposure, studies that examine the longitudinal effect of self-reported lifetime exposure on cognitive impairment would strengthen the evidence of a causal association," Dr. Eisner said.


He added that, because dementia is such a frightening disorder, more publicity about it as an effect of public smoking may be an effective deterrent.


"Greater public awareness would eventually translate into political action aimed at passing smoke-free legislation in regions of the world where public smoking is still permitted," he contended.



The study was funded by the National Institute on Aging and several agencies of the British government.

No potential conflicts of interest were reported by study authors or the editorialist.

Secondhand Smoke Linked to Adult Cognitive Impairment

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By John Gever, Senior Editor, MedPage Today
Reviewed by Robert Jasmer, MD; Associate Clinical Professor of Medicine, University of California, San Francisco . Earn CME/CE credit
for reading medical news

CAMBRIDGE, England, Passive smoking can damage the brain of those 50 and older, researchers here said

Nonsmokers with the heaviest secondhand smoke exposure were at a 44% higher risk of scoring in the bottom 10% on cognitive testing, compared with those with the lowest level of passive smoking (P=0.02), reported David J. Llewellyn, Ph.D., of the University of Cambridge, and colleagues online in BMJ.


This result occurred after controlling for such potential confounding factors as age, sex, ethnicity, alcohol consumption, socioeconomic status, education, physical activity, body weight, medical history, depressive symptoms, and ex-smoker status.


"This analysis is to our knowledge the first to examine the relation between exposure to secondhand smoke and cognitive impairment in a large heterogeneous population-based sample," according to the researchers. Other studies have connected secondhand smoke exposure to impaired cognition in children and adolescents.


They said the findings were of "major public health significance" and called for additional, prospective studies to confirm and extend them.


The study involved 4,809 self-described nonsmokers at least 50 years old who participated in both of two large national health surveys and gave saliva samples.


One of the surveys, the English Longitudinal Study of Aging, included detailed cognitive testing that evaluated immediate and delayed verbal memory, attention and processing speed, prospective memory, numerical abilities, and semantic fluency.


Those in the bottom 10% of the combined cognitive score were considered impaired.


Cotinine, a nicotine metabolite that signals recent exposure to tobacco smoke, was measured in the saliva samples. Participants with cotinine levels higher than 14 ng/mL were excluded to ensure the study population did not contain clandestine tobacco users.


After adjusting for the potential confounding factors, the researchers found that people in the highest quartile of cotinine level -- 0.8 to 13.5 ng/mL -- had an odds ratio of 1.44 of being impaired (95% CI 1.07 to 1.94), relative to those in the lowest quartile.


Participants in the second and third quartiles showed small and statistically insignificant risks of cognitive impairment.


The relation between passive smoking exposure and cognitive impairment was strongest in participants who never smoked.


Never-smokers in the highest cotinine quartile had an odds ratio for impairment of 1.70 (95% CI 1.03 to 2.80). For ex-smokers with the heaviest smoke exposure, the odds ratio was 1.32 (95% CI 0.92 to 1.91).


Dr. Llewellyn and colleagues said.......more later

Nutritional drink, imaging show promise for Alzheimer's (part 2)

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(CNN)

Scanning for the earliest signs

While the Souvenaid study focused on the loss of synapses as the mechanism behind Alzheimer's symptoms, an Italian group is working on identifying a different marker of the condition.

In a study published in the journal Neurology, researchers showed that a kind of MRI called diffusion tensor imaging may pick up signs of Alzheimer's in healthy elderly individuals.

Lead author Dr. Giovanni Carlesimo, of Tor Vergata University and the Santa Lucia Foundation in Rome, Italy, said the findings are preliminary but could be useful for future drug therapies to target the specific brain changes shown on the scan.

Researchers looked at the hippocampus, the brain structure associated with memory. They found that the mean diffusivity of the hippocampus -- a measure of how water is distributed within the tissues -- was correlated with how well participants performed on tests of verbal and visual-spatial memory.

The mean diffusivity in the hippocampus, as reflected in this brain scan, could represent some of the earliest structural changes that occur in the early stages of Alzheimer's, researchers say.

The research was done on 76 healthy people ages 20 to 80. The effect was most pronounced in the over-50-year-olds, the scientists reported.

The study is an important demonstration that MRI can be used to understand age-associated changes in the brain, said Adam Brickman, assistant professor of neuropsychology at Columbia University Medical Center.

But Brickman cautioned that this does not mean everyone should request this test.

"This might be something that will be useful down the road, but it's not diagnostic right now," he said.

Nutritional drink, imaging show promise for Alzheimer's

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(CNN) -- Doctors are already good at diagnosing Alzheimer's disease in a patient with obvious symptoms, which include memory loss, vision problems and confusion. But the cutting-edge research is looking for the brain mechanisms of the condition at its earliest stages, maximizing the potential for intervention.

Two studies published this week that may help pave the way for better treatments for people with Alzheimer's, which affects as many as 5.3 million Americans, according to the Alzheimer's Association. One is a drink that you may one day be able to pick up at the pharmacy; the other is a detection method.

Drink to your health?

One of the features of a brain with Alzheimer's disease is the loss of synapses, which are junctions between two neurons or between a neuron and a muscle. Research suggests some connection between low numbers of synapses in a person's brain and Alzheimer's symptoms such as memory impairment and language deterioration.

Scientists have developed a drink called Souvenaid that is a "medical food," meaning it's taken under the guidance of a physician to manage a specific condition. The drink has three components -- uridine, choline, and the omega-3 fatty acid DHA -- that, working together, help restore synapses, said Dr. Richard Wurtman, professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and co-author of the study. Uridine is a molecule used in the genetic coding for RNA, choline is in the vitamin B family, and DHA is found in certain fish and fish oils.

These nutrients are already found in the human body and have been shown to be safe, he said. But taking a supplement of any one of them will not have the same beneficial effect, he said. Together in the right proportions, the cocktail increases the production of fatty constituents and proteins needed for synapses.

The study looked at 225 patients who had mild Alzheimer's, according to an examination. Some took Souvenaid, and the control group participants received a non-medical drink, once a day for 12 weeks.

They found that patients showed significant improvement in the delayed verbal recall task, in which participants were asked to remember what they had been told earlier. The idea is that the formation of synapses delays the symptoms of Alzheimer's, but it is not a cure, experts said.

"There was a clear difference. The difference was greatest in people with very mild but quite real Alzheimer's," he said.

The product may be commercialized as early as next year, Nigel Hughes, general manager of Nutricia America. Nutricia is a unit of the international food giant Danone (Dannon in the United States), for which Wurtman is also a consultant.

There are other clinical studies of Souvenaid going on of 500 participants each, and the company plans to do an "early experience program" of selling the product in a small geographic area in the United States, having it available in pharmacies, he said.

Although the product has been shown to be safe, there is no evidence whatsoever that it should be taken by anyone who does not have mild or early stage Alzheimer's disease, Hughes said.

Early Alzheimer's patients drinking the combination of these nutrients is akin to pregnant women taking folic acid supplements, Wurtman said. It's not that they are deficient in these nutrients, but the addition of more of them carries benefits, he said.

Yian Gu, postdoctoral researcher in neurology at Columbia University Medical Center, who studies the relationship between diet and Alzheimer's, said the study looks promising if the claims of memory improvement hold up, but noted that further research should be done to confirm those results. There should also be comparisons with nutritional supplements currently available on the market, such as multivitamins and fish oil, Gu said.

There were also cognitive and memory tasks that the drink did not seem to improve, according to the study, and the researchers should look further into what other improvements can be seen besides the verbal recall finding, Gu said.

The study is published in the journal Alzheimer's & Dementia.

Not all the news on Alzheimer's treatments is positive. Patients in a phase III trial for tarenflurbil, a drug that showed promise in an earlier phase II trial, did not experience improvement in cognition or daily function compared with those who received a placebo, according to a recent study in the Journal of the American Medical Association.

Study finds snowballing effect in memory loss disease

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LOS ANGELES,(Xinhua) -- Researchers have found a snowballing effect in the Alzheimer's disease and are proposing early preventive treatment for effectiveness.

The findings of the study, conducted by the New York University's Langone Medical Center, was published in the January issue of the Alzheimer's & Dementia journal.

The study, involving 213 adults with and without subjective cognitive impairment (SCI) over an average of seven years, found that 54 percent of the SCI adults had aggravated into mild cognitive impairment (MCI) and even full-blown dementia, or long-term memory loss.

The study also found that only 15 percent of the non-SCI adultshad developed MCI or dementia.

"The findings indicate that a significant percentage of people with early subjective symptoms may experience further cognitive decline, whereas few persons without these symptoms decline.

"If decline does occur in those without SCI symptoms, it takes considerably longer than for those with subjective cognitive symptoms," said Barry Reisberg, lead researcher at the Langone Medical Center.

"This is the first study to use mild cognitive impairment as well as dementia as an outcome criterion to demonstrate the outcome of SCI as a possible forerunner of eventual Alzheimer's disease," the lead researcher added.

Researchers can now hopefully work out potential preventive therapy of the eventual Alzheimer's disease, popularly known as the senile dementia, as "these intriguing results more fully describe the possible relationship between early signs of memory loss and development of more serious impairment."

Physicians can possibly better target the prevention of the SCI which starts more than 20 years before dementia becomes evident.

"This is critical to know, as we look for ways to define who is at risk and for whom the earliest interventions might be successful," said Neil Buckholtz from the National Institute on Aging which supports the research.

"These findings also underscore the importance of clinicians' asking about, and listening to, concerns regarding changes in cognition and memory among their aging patients."

The Alzheimer's is so far an incurable disease that advances from confusions, to mood swings, to language breakdowns, and to finally long-term memory loss

Signs & Symptoms of Mild Alzheimer's

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eHow

Alzheimer's disease is a brain disorder that progresses over time. The hallmark of the disease is the formation of abnormal proteins called plaques and tangles. As these proteins increase in number, memory loss occurs. Also evident are changes in mood and behavior. Thinking, planning and language skills are affected. In the mild stage of Alzheimer's disease symptoms are bad enough to interfere with normal daily life. Each person who has Alzheimer's disease displays different symptoms, but most people with mild Alzheimer's disease have some symptoms in common.

Short-Term Memory Loss

People with mild Alzheimer's disease have significant short-term memory problems because the hippocampus portion of the brain is affected first. Think of the hippocampus as a filing cabinet. New information comes into the hippocampus but because it does not file the information properly, the information is lost and cannot be retrieved. Because of this, those with mild Alzheimer's repeat questions and have trouble completing daily activities.

Executive Function Deficits

Mild Alzheimer's disease results in a decrease in executive function. Executive function helps us connect past experience with present action. Because of this deficit, people with mild Alzheimer's disease have difficulty organizing, paying attention and remembering details. They have trouble paying their bills and handling money in general, planning events and have poor judgement.

Language Problems

Many individuals with mild Alzheimer's disease have trouble......read all of the Signs & Symptoms of Mild Alzheimer's

Political strategist Brazile headlines Alzheimer's Advocacy Forum

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ALZHEIMER'S ASSOCIATION

Veteran political strategist, syndicated columnist and commentator Donna Brazile is the keynote speaker at the Advocacy Forum of the 2010 Alzheimer’s Association Alzheimer’s Action Summit in Washington, D.C., March 7-9. Named one of the nation’s most powerful women by a number of influential publications, Brazile began her political career at the age of 9 when she worked to elect a City Council candidate who had promised to build a playground in her neighborhood. The candidate won, the swing sets were installed and a lifelong passion for political progress was ignited. Brazile will bring her fervor and knowledge of advocacy and the political process to our passionate gathering of Alzheimer advocates.

Register by Jan. 17 for an early-bird savings of $50

New Key Factor Identified in the Development of Alzheimer's Disease (part 2)

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ScienceDaily

Endosomes are membrane compartments in cells that support cell survival by absorbing outside nutrients and are crucial in neuronal functions. In Alzheimer's disease, endosome abnormalities are the earliest neuropathologic features to develop, appearing even earlier in cases where one of several major genetic risk factors for the disease in inherited. Endosomes are also suspected sites of Aβ production in the cells.

"In the field of Alzheimer's research, we have been questioning whether Aβ is the only target to better understand the progression of Alzheimer's disease and if lowering Aβ is the only hoped-for therapy," said Ralph Nixon, MD, PhD, professor, psychiatry and cell biology, director, NYU Center of Excellence on Brain Aging and the Silberstein Alzheimer's Institute at NYU Langone Medical Center. "This study demonstrates that an alternative protein factor, βCTF, derived from the gene APP, is also unequivocally involved in Alzheimer's disease and may be of additional importance for the development of future effective therapies."

Funding for this study was made possible through the National Institute on Aging (NIA) of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) The study was done in collaboration with NYU Langone Medical Center (NY, New York), the Center for Dementia Research at the Nathan Kline Institute (Orangeburg, NY); Mailman Research Center at McLean Hospital (Belmont, MA); Departments of Psychiatry and Neuropathology at Harvard Medical School (Boston, MA).

New Key Factor Identified in the Development of Alzheimer's Disease

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ScienceDaily — Inheritance of an extra copy of the gene- β -amyloid precursor protein, APP, in individuals with Down syndrome leads to the inevitable development of early onset Alzheimer's disease, known to be linked to the deposition of Amyloid β peptide or Aβ in the brain. However, a new study published online by Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences identifies βCTF, a small protein found in APP, as a novel factor for the development of Alzheimer's disease related endosome abnormalities, which have also been tied previously to the loss of brain cells in Alzheimer's disease.

"In the study, using the cells from individuals with Down syndrome that are genetically predisposed to developing Alzheimer's disease, we showed that elevated levels of βCTF, independent of Aβ, cause a specific pattern of endosome defects with similar pathology of brain cells in Alzheimer's disease," said Ying Jiang, PhD, lead author and clinical instructor in the Department of Psychiatry at NYU Langone Medical Center. "Our research was successfully able to pinpoint that βCTF causes Alzheimer's disease -related endosome defects and that we could successfully reverse these endosome defects by lowering βCTF levels in the cells."

Alzheimer's: Double Jeopardy

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Health News

The plight of having one parent with the mind-robbing disease, Alzheimer's, would be tough enough, but imagine it striking both parents. A recent study suggests that when both parents have the disease, their children face an increased risk of developing the condition.

In a study of 111 families, where both parents were affected with Alzheimer‘s, researchers found that more than 22 percent of their adult children had the disease themselves. This compares to prior studies, finding that 6 to13 percent of the U.S. population over 65 will develop the disease.

Alzheimer's typically starts about age 65 in adults who have two affected parents, and the odds of developing Alzheimer's grew with age. Also, the risk of developing Alzheimer's at an earlier age increases if additional relatives are affected with the disease.

In the study, diagnoses were confirmed through medical records, autopsies, and examination by researchers. The parents studied had 297 children who lived to adulthood, and 67 of those children had Alzheimer's. Of the 240 children who have not been affected, 78 percent have not yet reached their 70s and 80s, when disease claims most of its victims. Of the 98 children who have reached age 70, 41 of them (or about 42%,) had already developed Alzheimer's disease.

Experts have agreed that genetics plays a role in Alzheimer's disease, but the degree to which genetics is responsible for the disease is still unclear. "There probably is an increased risk of Alzheimer's disease in the children of spouses that both have the disease," said lead researcher Dr. Thomas D. Bird, a professor of neurology at the University of Washington School of Medicine in Seattle. "The exact magnitude of the risk, we don't know yet."

Bird's group is trying to determine the genetic factors at play. So far, only one genetic factor has been documented. "The hope is, there will be others and they will be found," Bird said. "Presumably, these children would have a higher concentration of those factors. So, that's what ought to be looked for."

Dr. Bird said he was uncomfortable saying the normal risk tripled or quadrupled in people with two affected parents, because the study was small and had no comparison group. "What I'm comfortable saying is that risk is increased and we're working on trying to find out what the magnitude is."

To date, there is no cure for the more than 26 million people worldwide estimated to have Alzheimer's, but there is strong hope that by the time many reach the age of risk, there will be better intervention methods.

The study, appearing in March's Archives of Neurology, was funded by the National Institute on Aging and the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs

Coin Trivia

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Here are some coin facts you can use when you have a discussion about coins with those who have Alzheimer's disease, arelated dementia or other long term care residents



United States Coins Facts
•The Booker T. Washington Memorial Half Dollar was the first United States coin to have an image of an African-American. It was minted from the years 1946 to 1951.
•The Liberty Head Nickel, first minted in 1883, did not have the word "cents" inscribed onto it. Dishonest investors illegally gold plated the coins and attempted to sell them as $5 gold pieces.. The United States Mint soon quickly figured out what was going on and added the word "cents" to the nickels.
•The inscription "E Pluribus Unum," meaning "One from Many" appeared on 1795 Liberty Cap-Heraldic Eagle gold $5 piece. This was the first time this motto was used on United States Coins.
•The United States Mint estimates that the average life expectancy of a circulating coin is about 30 years, whereas paper currency usually only lasts for as little as 18 months.
•The smallest denomination coin ever issued in the United States. was the half cent, which was minted from 1793 through 1857.
•The United States Mint produced its first circulating coins in 1793.
•There is more than $8 billion worth of coins circulating in the United States today. In the past 30 years, the United States Mint has minted over 300 billion coins, worth more than $15 billion.
•If one has three quarters, four dimes, and four pennies in your possession, they have the largest possible amount of money in United States coins without being able to make change for a dollar.
•The slang term for a United States dollar, "buck," is thought to have originated in the early United States frontier times when the hide of a male deer was a currency. The phrase "the buck stops here," was coined (pardon the pun) by United States President Harry Truman, and referenced the fact that a silver dollar coin was often passed around a poker table to show who was to pay the ante blinds.
•Calvin Coolidge was the first and only United States President to have his portrait appear on a coin minted while he was living.

Alzheimer's Limits Cancer Risk (part 2)

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Health News

The people that suffered from vascular dementia at the beginning of the study appeared to have no impact on hospitalization for cancer over the eight years of follow-up. But when compared to the people without Alzheimer’s, the patients with Alzheimer’s at the beginning of the study were 69 percent more likely to be hospitalized for cancer during the same time period. The risk of developing Alzheimer’s disease was also reduced by 43 percent in white patients that had a history of cancer, when compared to the participants without cancer. However, the findings did not hold for other ethnic and racial groups. This new study appears online in the January 12 issue of the journal Neurology.



Roe says that more research will be needed to determine if cancer and the degenerative brain diseases, such as Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s, really are related. She said, “We are in the beginning stages of this research. There is a lot to be done before concluding that a link exists.

David Knopman, M.D., who is an Alzheimer’s disease specialist, agrees but says that his own clinical experience makes him think that something is going on. Knopman is currently a member of the Alzheimer’s Disease Research Center at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota and a professor of neurology.

Knopman said, “I see (Alzheimer’s) patients for four, five, and six years at an age when cancer is common, and they don’t seem to die of cancer as often as other patients. If there are shared genetic factors at work in cancer and Alzheimer’s disease, the Alzheimer’s community may be able to learn from cancer research and the cancer community can learn from Alzheimer’s

Alzheimer’s Limits Risk for Cancer

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Health News

Alzheimer's and cancer, two dreaded diseases, may not like to cohabitate in the same body, at least for some populations. Those who suffer from Alzheimer’s disease may actually have some protection against cancer and vice versa, early research suggests.

When comparing elderly study participants that did not have Alzheimer’s disease to those with Alzheimer’s, it was found that they were much less likely to be diagnosed with cancer. AT the other end of the spectrum, elderly white patients that had cancer at the beginning of the study were much less likely to develop Alzheimer’s disease, however, the lower risk was not seen in the other groups.

Several previous studies showed a lower incidence of cancer in the patients that had Parkinson’s disease, which, like Alzheimer’s, is a degenerative disorder that affects the brain. Newly published research suggests a similar link between Alzheimer’s disease and cancer. Catherine M. Roe, Ph.D., from Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis and lead researcher for the study, said, “This study adds to the literature suggesting that cancer and neurodegenerative diseases may be related.”

In an earlier study, Roe and her colleagues reported that elderly patients who suffered from Alzheimer’s developed cancer much later than patients without dementia. Also, the patients that had a history of cancer tended to be diagnosed with dementia later in life. However, it was not clear if the association was because of the confounding factors, such as the fact that patients with cancer often die before they can reach the high-risk age for Alzheimer’s disease and the patients that suffer for Alzheimer’s tend to be screened less for cancer. In the new study, Roe and her colleagues attempted to control for many of these potential factors.

The study included patients that suffered from Alzheimer’s disease, which is caused by a loss of nerve cells in the brain, and vascular dementia, which is caused by an impaired blood flow to the brain as a result of a stroke and other cardiovascular causes. In addition, approximately 3,000 people age 65 and older that were enrolled in a large heart health study were included in the analysis.