A “family caregiver” is a family member or friend who cares for someone who is disabled. Many disabled persons have only one such caregiver. Such solitary caregivers tend to suffer from a great deal of stress and, as a result, are vulnerable to illness.

One source of stress, especially for caregivers who are losing a parent, spouse, partner or friend to Alzheimer’s or another kind of dementia, is seemingly endless mourning. First, they lose the person who was able to be independent and to take care of himself. Then they lose the person who has been a companion in making decisions and enjoying life. Finally, in the case of someone suffering from advanced dementia, they lose the person who has recognized and known them.

The obvious suffering of their loved ones who are losing abilities, independence and parts of themselves sometimes makes it difficult for caregivers even to admit that they too are hurting.

“What right do I have to be upset,” a caregiver may ask herself, “when my loved one is losing and suffering so much?”

A geriatric care manager can help caregivers recognize, accept and express their feelings of mourning and can refer them to caregiver support groups that can help in these ways. Freedom to mourn is freedom to love the person one is losing, to receive from them what they can still give, to care for them with realism, intelligence and tenderness, and to take care of oneself.

Denials of mourning by caregivers are common and understandable, but they can have tragic results. A caregiver who cuts herself off from her mourning may not be able to recognize, affirm and enjoy the ways her loved one is still present. For example, even a person with advanced dementia can often, with encouragement, remember and tell stories about his childhood and early life. He will sometimes respond with physical warmth and even playfulness to a loved one whom he does not remember, but whose affectionate touch is familiar. In order to receive such gifts, a caregiver must be able to admit her feelings for and thus her mourning of her loved one.
Caregivers sometimes deny the feelings of anger about losing their loved one that is part of mourning. The repressed anger can break out in hurtful ways. For instance, a caregiver may become cold and distant in dealing with his loved one. Or he may find that he is constantly frustrated with and critical of her for what she can no longer do.

Often caregivers feel guilty about their anger. They become critical of themselves for what they have not done or are not doing or for their lack of compassion. Such guilt results in a vicious circle. When they attack themselves, caregivers become more exhausted, less able to care, and less able to love, which can lead them to be even angrier with themselves.

Caregivers who are caught up in guilt and the denial of mourning and who face the overwhelming demands of caregiving on their time and energy tend to neglect their own needs and health. Too often such neglect leads caregivers to become ill themselves.

Getting help with mourning from a geriatric care manager or a support group is thus a way of caring for both one’s loved one and oneself.

Dr. Herndon is with Community Geriatric Care Management, a wholly owned subsidiary of Foremost Home Care. communitygeriatriccare@gmail.com

That may seem inconsequential, but consider this: Hoeffer is an assistant professor in the Department of Physiology and Neuroscience at New York University’s Langone Medical Center. He researches human learning and memory—specifically, how they are affected by neurological and neurodegenerative disorders like autism, down syndrome and Alzheimer’s. To study these conditions, he uses live mice.

“I essentially have a little mouse circus downstairs,” Hoeffer said of his lab in the basement of the Joan and Joel Smilow Research Center, one of Langone’s many buildings between East 30th and 34th streets and First Avenue and FDR Drive. These are not mice you see scurrying across the street: They are carefully bred to replicate specific genes involved in human disorders, for instance, or to have other exact traits. Producing these exact mice can take months, even a year, of studious cross-breeding, depending on the complexity of the trait needed.

“You can’t replace the time,” Hoeffer said. “That’s the real loss.”

On Monday, Oct. 29, Hoeffer watched from his apartment building next door as his downstairs lab along with the rest of Langone’s lower floors filled with floodwater. The damage was swift, the result of a storm surge that pushed the East River’s water beyond First Avenue along the Upper East Side. Langone’s backup generator failed in the middle of the night, forcing staff at the center’s hospital to evacuate hundreds of patients and jeopardizing any materials throughout the center that needed refrigeration to survive.

Langone had vivariums (cages that house lab animals) spread throughout the center, some in basements and others at higher levels. NYU is still in the midst of assessing the extent of damages to its faculty’s research projects, but Hoeffer explained that these damages varied significantly from researcher to researcher. In terms of mice, some people who kept them in above-ground facilities were totally unaffected, while others who worked exclusively in underground labs suffered more crippling losses.

For Hoeffer, things could have been much worse, he said. He worked below ground in Smilow, but also has mice above-ground in a satellite lab. “We’re still trying to find out what we lost exactly,” he noted, “but I think that almost all our losses are pretty quickly replaceable.”

Neither Hoeffer nor NYU had specific estimates of the number of mice killed. Hoeffer tended about 300 mice, but bigger labs, he said, kept up to 6,000. It is still unclear how many of these mice were caged high enough in labs to avoid floodwater or removed in advance.

Hoeffer was optimistic about the recovery process, and pointed out many silver linings to the destruction. “The community definitely got closer,” he said, and also mentioned thankfully that researchers across the country—and world—offered their support in the wake of the storm, sharing data and donating supplies.

A disaster like this shows “what’s really important to human health and science,” Hoeffer said, “what really needs to get done, and what kind of things you can live without.”

During the flooding, NYU’s Division of Laboratory Animal Resources (DLAR) worked throughout the night, and the following days, to save what remaining animals they could after removing as many animals as possible days in advance of the storm. DLAR’s director, who asked not to be named for protection from animal rights groups, said that floodwater rushed into basement facilities “like [on] the Titanic.”

The director noted that a number of mice in vivariums high off the floor of flooded labs were found alive and well last week. Some had babies.

Hoeffer explained, “It’s not this complete tragic situation. It’s not cataclysmic. The great thing about science is that you can change your question or change your approach. You can still do important things, just not the way you originally planned.”

State Sen. Toby Ann Stavisky

A Queens man named Jesus Palomino recently swore in an affidavit that his mother could not have signed a petition form for two dozen candidates, including State Sen. Toby Ann Stavisky, on June 14th. The reason? The woman, Ana Rita Palomino, had been dead since February 5th, 2011.

The affidavit was produced by Stavisky’s opponent John Messer’s campaign and is posted below.

Queens Democratic party-backed candidates frequently petition in tandem and list each other on shared petitions. Stavisky is included with at least two dozen other candidates on this petition, according to her campaign, who said they were not familiar with the witness, Ashoka Bhattacharjee, who signed the petition form that includes the dead woman’s signature.

Messer campaign staff scrolled through the nominating petitions and knocked on signatories’ doors to verify the names. The campaign provided the affidavit to City and State, in which Palomino’s son Jesus wrote:

“I the undersigned do hereby swear and say that Ana Rita Palomino was my mother and she formally resided at 159-09 Goethals Ave in Jamaica, NY. The petition signature shown to me that desigantes Toby Stavisky for the office of State Senator and submitted to the Board of Election can not be that of my mother. My mother passed away in February 5th of 2011.”

A source close to the Messer campaign said the campaign intends to produce at least 51 sworn affidavits from people who claim their petition signatures are not valid, including ”two people who are being treated for Alzheimer’s at facilities out of state,” the source said.

To read the full article at City & State click here.

Many older people live alone and do not have a close family member or friend living nearby who can help them if they become ill and unable to do all the tasks necessary to maintain their lives at home. They or a family member will sometimes employ a geriatric care manager.

A geriatric care manager can perform a range of needed tasks, such as helping with paying bills; planning for medical care and ensuring that a client goes to doctor’s appointments; working with doctors, nurses and social workers at hospitals and rehabilitation centers to ensure that a client receives the best possible medical care; arranging for and supervising home care aides; and working with a client to maintain his or her quality of life.

For example, a professional colleague referred me to Ms. D, who lives alone. She had been a professor until she was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease.

The first time I met her, she told me that she had been having increasing trouble remembering how to pay her bills. Sometimes she got disoriented on the subway, even when going to a familiar place, and panicked when she realized she did not know where she was. She needed help logging on to check her email. She did not remember how to tell the time from a digital clock. She did not know how to retrieve messages from her answering machine. She was overwhelmed, uncertain and close to despair.

Since that first meeting, I have met with her in her home for two hours a week. As I help her go through her mail, pay bills, check her email and do other tasks, I repeatedly confirm what she can do. She is a witty conversationalist. She has become active in the senior center and is going to be teaching a writing class there. She maintains close friendships.

By the second or third meeting, she had become more confident. She has stopped getting lost or panicked on the subway. She continues to have difficulties with other tasks, but, as I help her with them, her lack of ability rarely overwhelms her. She is enjoying her time at the senior center and conversations with friends.

This case illustrates a principle in working with someone suffering with dementia: Help with the specific tasks with which she is having difficulty, but repeatedly and consistently confirm her remaining abilities and help her find others who will appreciate what she knows and can do.

Roy Herndon Smith, Ph.D., is with Community Geriatric Care (communitygeriatriccare@gmail.com), a subsidiary of Foremost Home Care.

A few years ago, one of the residents of a West Side senior center began to sell their neighbors an alternative to Con Edison.

“They began to sell to them a different kind of lighting company,” said Micki Navarro, director of the Manhattan Valley Senior Center. “Well, it was all a scam. And they had to put a deposit down to get this.”

It wasn’t until one of the seniors mentioned it to one of the center’s social workers that they were finally able to start tracking the crime and looking for the scammers. By then it was too late.

“We traced it to somebody we couldn’t really trace,” Navarro said.

This isn’t an anomaly. Many elderly New Yorkers know the traditional safeguards to prevent pickpockets and burglaries. But, because they prey on trust, scammers can be much harder to avoid.

According to Ken Onaitis, head of the elder abuse department at the Carter Burden Center for the Aging, many scammers target the elderly, who can often be lonely or vulnerable.

Ageism is another reason scammers seek out senior citizens. Some see seniors’ physical or mental limitations as an invitation to go after them. Navarro said scammers target some elderly victims because of mental issues like depression, Alzheimer’s and dementia.

“Those people who commit the fraud, they know all of this,” she said. “They prepare. They do research and watch. They watch their prey and they attack when they know it’s the right time.”

Because scams can happen in person or by mail, phone or computer, there’s no sure-fire rule to avoid scams. But common sense is the best way to keep out of the crosshairs of con artists.

“If an offer sounds too good to be true,” Onaitis said. “It probably is.”

Here are some common scams to be wary of:

• While the mail is still used, email and computer-based scams are more common today. Never give out your social security number, bank information or other sensitive information over the Internet unless you absolutely trust the source on the other end. Even then, it’s good to make sure you verify as much as you can and never give money to people you don’t know.

• Phone scams are also common, according to Onaitis. Some scammers call dozens of people a day trying to gather sensitive data or sell fake products.

“The main thing is that if you get someone on the phone requesting information, trying to get information out of you, just hang up,” said Onaitis.

• According to Navarro, another common scam is those who wait until seniors receive social security money. When seniors go to withdraw money from ATMs, some people follow them home and try to sell them things.

• Make sure you feel comfortable with the person on the other side of the door before you open it. If someone says they are in a position of authority, always ask them for identification.

Navarro said that many seniors grew up when door-to-door salespeople were much more common. Some scammers take advantage of that trust to enter people’s homes. “They don’t know who they’re letting in,” she said.

The first thing anyone should do if they feel scammed is call the police in the precinct in which the crime happened. Many people are ashamed to admit they’ve been had.

Beyond the police, there are resources like the city’s Department for the Aging and community organizations like the Carter Burden Center, which help people respond to scams and go to court if necessary.

Still, prevention is much more simple than the cure. People should take simple steps to keep all personal information private and never give money to people based on a promise, because once scammed, it can be very hard to get the money back.

“Usually when the money’s gone, the money’s gone,” Onaitis said.

“We wanted to tease out which of these two behaviors may be associated with lower risk for AD, or if the combination of the two is associated with decreased risk even further,” Nikos Scarmeas, M.D., lead author of the study, said.

Researchers interviewed 1,880 elderly subjects in a multi-ethnic community in upper Manhattan. Their average age was 77, and all the subjects did not have Alzheimer’s. They answered questions about their level of physical activity and dietary habits. The scientists then followed them over the next five and a half years and observed which subjects developed Alzheimer’s.

It turned out that a Mediterranean-type diet—characterized by fish, vegetables, legumes, fruits, cereals and monounsaturated fatty acids—was the most effective at preventing Alzheimer’s. Subjects who adhered to the diet had a 40 percent risk reduction. Those who were physically active—without the added benefit of the diet—had a 33 percent risk reduction, and those who adhered to both the diet and the exercise had a 60 percent reduction.

Dr. Scarmeas emphasized that even small lifestyle changes can help prevent Alzheimer’s disease.

Baruch College President Resigns; Dr. Stan Altman Named Interim President
Baruch College President Kathleen Waldron announced her resignation August 18, according to a statement released by CUNY Chancellor Matthew, and said she will be returning as CUNY professor.

“We are grateful to Dr. Waldron for her presidential service during the past five years and join with all members of the Baruch College community in expressing our very best wishes,” Chancellor Goldstein said.

Interim President Stan Altman, who served with distinction as Dean of the School of Public Affairs at Baruch College from 1999 to 2005, has been named by the Board of Trustees Executive Committee, on the recommendation of the Chancellor. “Interim President Altman has extensive academic and administrative experience in higher education and we are fortunate that he is available to serve the college in this interim capacity,” Goldstein added. “A national search for a permanent president will be quickly initiated, consistent with university guidelines. Given the stature of Baruch College, it is our expectation that a high-quality pool of candidates will emerge. As the start of the fall semester nears, I look forward to an outstanding year at Baruch. The exemplary work of the college’s faculty and staff has always been at the core of Baruch’s historic reputation.”

The Princeton Review named Baruch College one of the best in America, according to their 2010 Edition of “The Best 371 Colleges.” Baruch College is also named one of the nation’s 50 best value public undergraduate institutions, according to the 2008 Princeton Review’s America’s Best Value Colleges. Forbes magazine and the Kaplan/Newsweek 2008 edition of America’s Hottest Colleges also rank Baruch highly.

Hunter College Partners with City to Prevent Nursing Shortage
The Hunter-Bellevue Accelerated Second-Degree Pathway, an intensive 14-month nursing program, was recently launched by Hunter-Bellevue School of Nursing as part of an effort to stem the critical shortage of nurses in New York City. City Council Speaker Christine Quinn lauded the Hunter program at a press conference at Bellevue Hospital on July 27 and announced a $500,000, five-year grant to CUNY nursing programs. According to sources, the money will help fund the Hunter-Bellevue accelerated nursing program in addition to other initiatives, such as one to place working nurses in short-term teaching positions at Lehman College and Borough of Manhattan Community College. CUNY will also be able to admit an additional 500 nursing students over five years. “We need to fill jobs that are in demand,” Quinn said.

Hunter President Jennifer J. Raab called the new program a “great idea” and went on to state: “We can take career changers and move them into the much-in-demand field of nursing.”

According to a Hunter College release, it is estimated that another 7,000 more nurses will be needed in New York by 2020, as the workforce continues to age. According to Hunter, however, 575 CUNY nursing applicants were turned away last year because of the lack of teaching capacity.

Kristine Gebbie, Dean of the School of Nursing, supports the initiative, stating, “As these adult learners become RNs, they increase our ability to meet the nursing needs of the city and elsewhere.”

U.S. Department of Education Gives Grant Moey to John Jay College to Support Improvements
It’s not all CSI all the time. The U.S. Department of Education Office of Safe and Drug-Free Schools awarded a $768,000 Emergency Management for Higher Education grant to the John Jay College’s Office of Continuing and Professional Studies.

Among other things, the grant money is meant to strengthen the “bridges” that link CUNY to the New York City Office of Emergency Management and the NYC Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, as well as developing and installing a secure, searchable “IT/GIS-based emergency management tool.”

According to Project Director Richard Glover, “The goal of this project is to develop a single, CUNY-wide, structured, comprehensive all-hazards, fully integrated plan between July 2009 and December 2010. As this goal is accomplished, the CUNY community will realize an increase in campus safety and the safety of the New York City physical communities of which the individual colleges are an integral part. The resulting CUNY ACEMS is intended to become a model of higher educational institution readiness and emergency management for small, medium and large campuses throughout the county.”

To this end, John Jay College will partner with the Borough of Manhattan Community College to expand the training offered to members of the CUNY campus community. As stated in a recent release from the college, this joint effort between a two-year and a four-year CUNY campus reflects a strategic plan to create a synergy resulting from the two campuses having been recipients of two of five grant awards made in New York State under US DOE’s EMHE grant program. John Jay College will coordinate overall emergency readiness management for CUNY while BMCC will function as the emergency management training center, taking full advantage of its new training facility in lower Manhattan.