EBRCOA: IN THE KNOW SENIOR GLOSSARY
TERMS YOU SHOULD KNOW
A-B
Senior Glossary
Activities of Daily Living (ADLs): Activities people usually do for themselves in the course of a normal day including bathing, dressing, grooming, eating, walking, using the telephone, taking medications, and other personal care activities. Adult Protective Services (APS): Services that protect the rights of frail older adults by investigating cases of abuse, neglect, and financial exploitation as mandated by law. Advance Directive: Legal document allowing people, if they become incapacitated, to give others legally binding instructions about their preference regarding health care decisions. Types of advance directives include documents such as the living will and durable power of attorney for health care. Affordable Care Act (ACA): The comprehensive health care reform law enacted in March 2010 (sometimes known as ACA, PPACA, or “Obamacare”). Aging in Place: Choosing to remain at home instead of moving to a senior living arrangement. Typically means that older adults get to retain a level of autonomy and independence not available with other senior living options. Alzheimer’s Disease: Alzheimer’s is a type of dementia that affects memory, thinking, and behavior. Symptoms eventually grow severe enough to interfere with daily tasks. Area Agency on Aging: A local or regional agency, funded under the federal Older Americans Act through the state unit on aging, that plans and coordinates various social and health service programs for persons 60 years of age and older. The national network of AAA offices consists of 655 approved area agencies on aging (not including Native American Aging Programs). Assisted Living Facilities: A facility that provides a combination of housing and personalized health care in a professionally managed group setting designed to respond to the individual needs of persons who need help with activities of daily living. The facility provides care to residents who cannot live independently, but individuals do not require 24-hour nursing care. Assistive Technology: Any service or tool that helps the elderly or disabled do the activities they have always done but must now do differently. These tools are also sometimes called “adaptive devices.” Such technology may be something as simple as using a walker to make it easier to move around or an amplification device to make sounds easier to hear when talking on the telephone or watching television.
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Frequently Used Aging Terms
B-C
Senior Glossary
Bowel incontinence: Bowel incontinence, also called fecal incontinence, happens when you’re not able to control your bowel movements, leading you to leak solid or liquid stool. It’s more common in older people, but anyone can get bowel incontinence. Nearly 18 million adults in the U.S. have bowel incontinence. Care or Case Management: Case managers work with family members and older adults to assess, arrange, and evaluate supportive efforts of seniors and their families to remain independent. Caregiver: Can be either informal (unpaid) or formal (usually paid). An informal caregiver is a person who provides care and assistance with various activities to a family member, friend or neighbor. Formal caregivers are volunteers or paid providers who are usually associated with an agency or social service system. Roughly 75 percent of all caregiving for older persons is provided by informal caregivers, e.g., family, friends, and neighbors. Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS): A federal organization that oversees the Medicare and Medicaid programs. Its primary goal is to ensure effective, up-to-date health care coverage and to promote quality care, with little or no co-payment, for beneficiaries. It also provides information to help consumers in choosing a variety of service providers through its website. Chore Service: Chore services may be sought by persons who are physically unable to perform tasks such as heavy cleaning, minor repairs, or yard work. Community Based Services: Services designed to help older and disabled people remain independent and in their own homes. They include activities that may be provided by senior centers, transportation, home-delivered meals or congregate meals, visiting nurses and/or home health aides, adult day care, and homemaker services. Congregate Meals: These meal programs provide older individuals with free or low-cost, nutritionally sound meals served five days a week in easily accessible locations. Besides promoting better health through improved nutrition, meal programs provide daily activities and socialization for participants, which help reduce the isolation of old age. Continuum of Care: A term for the entire spectrum of specialized health, rehabilitative and residential services available to the frail and chronically ill, specifically, home services, independent living, assisted living, and nursing home care.
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Frequently Used Aging Terms
D-G
Senior Glossary
Deductible: The total initial amount insured parties must pay for services covered under an insurance plan before the insurer pays benefits. Dementia: A term describing a group of diseases (including Alzheimer’s Disease) characterized by memory loss and other declines in mental and sometimes emotional functioning. Disability: A limitation in physical, mental, or social activity. There are varying types (functional, occupational, learning), degrees (partial, total), and durations (temporary, permanent) of disabilities. Doughnut hole: Also known as the Medicare coverage gap, the doughnut hole refers to the requirement that enrollees in Part D prescription drug plans pay 100 percent of their prescription drug costs after their total drug spending i.e., what the plan had paid plus the enrollee’s deductible and copays exceeds an initial coverage limit and until they qualify for catastrophic coverage. Durable medical equipment (DME): Equipment and supplies ordered by a health care provider for everyday or extended use. Coverage for DME may include: oxygen equipment, wheelchairs, crutches, or blood testing strips for diabetics. Elder Abuse: A term referring to any knowing, intentional, or negligent act by a caregiver or any other person that causes harm or a serious risk of harm to a vulnerable adult. Law varies from state to state, but broadly defined, abuse may be physical, emotional, sexual, financial, neglect, and abandonment. Emergency Response System (ERS): A call button – usually worn as a necklace by an older individual- which can be pushed to reach family, friends, or help in case of an emergency. Energy Assistance: Programs that provide low-income elderly homeowners and renters with funds to help pay home utility and heating costs. Eligibility requirements may vary from state to state. Geriatrics: A branch of medicine focusing on the physiology and ailments associated with the aging process. Geriatrician: A physician who is certified by the American Board of Internal Medicine of Family Practice in the care of older people.
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Frequently Used Aging Terms
G-H Geriatric Care Managers: Specifically trained professional in geriatric care management, who provide case management services to older individual clients on a fee-for-service basis. Gerontology: The study of the physical, psychological, and social aspects of aging. Grandfamilies: Families where grandparents or other relatives are primarily responsible in caring for a child or children who lives with them, often referred to as kinship care. Guardian: An individual appointed by a court of law to manage a person’s financial and/ or personal affairs because the court has found that the person is not competent to manage his or her own affairs. A conservator is similarly appointed, but only for financial affairs. Guardianship: The process where an individual is appointed by a court of law to manage a person’s financial and/or personal affairs when people are not able to or not competent to manage their affairs on their own. Health-Care Proxy: A power of attorney that allows an agent to make health care decisions for an individual who is incapable of making them. Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA): This 1996 federal law enacted health insurance reforms to protect the health insurance coverage of workers (and their families) when they change or lose jobs, and under certain circumstances, people buying insurance on their own. It also includes provisions on administrative simplification and privacy standards for health care transactions and data, addresses health care fraud and abuse, offers tax deductions for health premiums paid by the self- employed and for the costs of long-term services and supports. Health Maintenance Organization (HMO): A health-care organization offering a range of health services to its members for a set rate that requires members to receive care only from health care professionals who are part of the organization’s selected network of providers. Home-Delivered Meals: Sometimes referred to as “meals on wheels,” home-delivered meals are hot and nutritious meals delivered to medically homebound seniors 60 years of age and older, who are unable to prepare their own meals and have no outside assistance. Senior Glossary
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Frequently Used Aging Terms
H-I
Senior Glossary
Homebound: The term refers to a person who is generally unable to leave the house, or if the person does leave home, it is usually only for a short time (e.g. for medical appointments). Individuals may attend adult day programs, religious services, or occasional special social outings and still be considered homebound Home Health Agency: An organization providing medically skilled home-care services, such as skilled nursing care, physical therapy, occupational therapy, speech therapy, and personal care by home health aides. Home Health Care: Home health care is recognized as an increasingly important alternative to hospitalization or care in a nursing home for patients who do not need 24-hours-a-day professional supervision. Many people find it possible to remain at home for the entire duration of their illness or at least to shorten their hospital stay. In many cases readmission to the hospital can be prevented or delayed. A variety of health services are provided in a home health care program in the patient’s home, under the direction of a physician. Homemaker Service: A service providing assistance with meal preparation, shopping, light housekeeping, laundry, and other tasks that enable clients to continue to live in their own homes. Home Modification: Adaptation and/or renovation to the living environment intended to increase ease of use, safety, security, and independence. There are some local, state, federal, and volunteer programs that provide special grants, loans, and other assistance for home remodeling, repair, and modification. Independent Living: A living arrangement that maximizes independence and self- determination, for people with disabilities who live in a community instead of a medical facility. Independent Living Facility: Rental unit wherein services are not included as part of the rent. Rather, services may be available and purchased by residents for an additional fee. Instrumental Activities of Daily Living (IADL): Household/independent living tasks that include using the telephone, taking medications, money management, housework, meal preparation, laundry, and grocery shopping. Intergenerational: Programs and projects occurring among generations.
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Frequently Used Aging Terms
L-M Legal Assistance: Legal advice and representation is available to persons aged 60 and over for certain types of legal matters including government program benefits, tenant rights, and consumer problems. Living Will: A document stating a person’s preferences for future medical decisions, including the withholding or withdrawing of life-sustaining treatments; such as artificial nutrition and hydration or the use of equipment, such as ventilators and respirators. Long-Term Care: A general term that describes a range of medical, nursing, custodial, social, and community services designed to help people with chronic health impairments or forms of dementia. Long-Term Care Insurance: This type of insurance policy is designed to cover long-term care expenses in a facility or at home. Managed Care: A method of organizing and financing health care services that emphasizes cost-effectiveness and coordination of care. Managed care organizations receive a fixed amount of money per client/member per month (this is called capitation). The system generally requires members to receive treatment from an approved list of health care facilities and physicians agreeing to provide services at set rates. Meals-on-Wheels: Also known as home-delivered meals that provide hot meals, prepared to government specifications, delivered to homebound persons who cannot prepare their own food. Medicare: This is the national health insurance program for eligible people 65 and older and some disabled individuals. Medicaid: Medicaid is a health benefit program administered by states for low-income people who also meet other eligibility requirements. The health insurance program is financed by the federal and state governments. Medicaid may also pay for nursing home care if the individual’s income and assets are within certain limits. Medigap: Medigap is designed specifically to supplement and complement Medicare’s benefits by filling in some of the gaps of Medicare coverage. Medigap insurance policies are non-group policies that may pay for Medicare deductibles, prescription drugs, or other services not covered by Medicare. Senior Glossary
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Frequently Used Aging Terms
M-R
Senior Glossary
Medicaid Waiver Programs: Medicaid programs that provide home-care and community-based alternatives to nursing home care. These programs have the potential to reduce Medicaid costs by providing services in innovative ways to people not covered under the traditional Medicare Program. They are often approved on an individual basis, and generally have limited slots available. Needs Assessment: An evaluation of a person’s physical and/or mental status. It is used to create a care plan and to make decisions about the possible need for care. Nursing Home: A facility licensed by the state to offer residents personal care as well as skilled nursing care on a 24-hour basis. Nursing homes provided nursing care, personal care, room and board, supervision, medication, therapies, and rehabilitation. Rooms are often shared and communal dining is common. Nurse Practitioners (NPs): Advanced practice RNs who provide a wide range of healthcare services across healthcare settings. NPs take health histories and provide complete physical examinations; diagnose and treat many common acute and chronic problems; interpret laboratory results and x-rays; prescribe and manage medications and other therapies; provide health teaching and supportive counseling with an emphasis on prevention of illness and health maintenance; and refer patients to other health professionals as needed. Broad NP specialty areas include: acute care, adult health, family health, geriatrics, neonatal, pediatric, psychiatric/mental health, school health, and women’s health. Older Americans Act: Federal legislation specifically addressing the needs of older adults. It provides funding for aging services such as home-delivered meals, congregate meals, senior centers, employment programs to the independence and quality of life for older Americans and those who care for them. Creates the structure of the federal Administration on Aging, State Units on Aging, and local agencies that oversee aging programs. Provider: Individual or organization that provides health care or long-term care services (e.g. doctors, hospital, physical therapists, home health aides, and more). Quality of Care: A measure of the degree to which delivered health services meet established professional standards and judgments of value to the consumer. Rehabilitation Services: Services designed to improve/restore a person’s functioning. These include physical therapy, occupational therapy, and/or speech therapy. The services are provided at home or in long-term care.
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Frequently Used Aging Terms
R-S Respite Care: The provision of short-term relief (respite) to families caring for their frail elders. It offers tremendous potential to maintain dependent persons in the least restrictive environment. Respite services encompass traditional home-based care, as well as adult day health, skilled nursing, home health aide, and short-term institutional care. Respite can vary in time from part of a day to several weeks. Reverse Mortgage: A loan available to seniors used to release the home equity in the property as one lump sum or multiple payments. The homeowner’s obligation to repay the loan is deferred until the owner dies, the home is sold, or the owner leaves (e.g. goes into a nursing home). However, the homeowner must continue to pay taxes and utilities. Senior Centers: A vital link in the service delivery network for use by seniors, senior centers may function as meal sites, screening clinics, recreational centers, social service agency branch offices, mental health counseling clinics, older worker employment agencies, volunteer coordinating centers, and community meeting halls. The significance of senior centers cannot be underestimated for they provide a sense of belonging, offer the opportunity to see old acquaintances, make new friends, and encourage individuals to pursue activities of personal interest and involvement in the community. Social Security: A federal social insurance program established in 1935 that includes a retirement income program, disability, and survivor Supplemental Security Income benefits, and health insurance through the Medicare program. Spend Down: A Medicaid financial eligibility requirement that requires beneficiaries to spend down their income/or assets by paying for health care with their own assets or income until they reach the income-eligibility level. Support Groups: Groups of people who share a common bond (e.g. caregivers) and come together on a regular basis to share problems and experiences. The groups may be sponsored by social service agencies, senior centers, and religious organizations. State Units on Aging (SUAs) : The Older Americans Act mandates that each state have a state agency on aging which is part of state government. The State Agency on Aging is the designated focal point within the state government responsible for administering a complex service system designed to complement and support other human service systems in meeting the needs of the elderly. Senior Glossary
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Frequently Used Aging Terms
S-V
Senior Glossary
Supplemental Security Income (SSI): The SSI program, implemented in 1974, was designed to reduce poverty by providing basic cash support to poor people who are aged, blind, or disabled. This federal program provides a monthly cash benefit that comes from general tax revenues. Some states supplement the basic federal benefit. Transportation: Programs that provide door-to-door transportation for people who may be elderly or disabled, do not have private transportation and are unable to use public transportation to meet their needs. Urinary incontinence: Urinary incontinence — the loss of bladder control — is a common and often embarrassing problem. The severity ranges from occasionally leaking urine when you cough or sneeze to having an urge to urinate that’s so sudden and strong you don’t get to a toilet in time. Vulnerable: People who cannot protect themselves because they are physically or cognitively incapacitated or impaired.
10 Frequently Used Aging Terms
Senior Glossary Sources: https://www.aarp.org/content/dam/aarp/about_aarp/aarp_policies/2011_04/pdf/glossary.pdf https://westchesterpartnership.org/resources/glossary-of-aging-related-terms/
11 Frequently Used Aging Terms
SENIOR ACTIVITY CENTERS & *NUTRITIONAL SITES
Antioch Senior Center 7140 East Antioch Rd. Baton Rouge, LA 70817 Phone: 225-246- 7994 Baker Senior Center 3334 Jefferson St. Baker, LA 70714 Phone: 225-366-6432 Ben Burge Senior Center 9350 Antigua Dr. Baton Rouge, LA 70810 Phone: 225-228-2670 Central Lotus Activity Center 11111 Park Place, Suite C Central, LA 70818 Phone: 225-615-8339 Chaneyville Senior Center 13211 Jackson Rd. Zachary, LA 70791 Phone: 225-286-4101 Charles R. Kelly Senior Center 3939 Riley St.
Greater King David Senior Center 131 Elmer Ave. Baton Rouge, LA 70807 Phone: 225-775-4996 Highland Road Senior Center 14024 North Amiss Rd. Baton Rouge, LA 70810 Phone: 225-454-4773 Homewood Aquatic Senior Center 3654 Granada Dr. Baton Rouge, LA 70810 Phone: 225-636-5611 Jewel J. Newman Senior Center 2013 Central Rd.
The Lotus Center 1701 Main St.
Baton Rouge, LA 70802 Phone: 225-923-8000 Zachary Lotus Activity Center 6363 Main Street, Suite L Zachary, LA 70791 Phone: 225-306-4102 *OLOL Senior Residential Living 7565 Bishop Ott Dr. Baton Rouge, LA 70806 Phone: 225-223-6559 *Catholic Presbyterian Apartments 655 North St.
Baton Rouge, LA 70707 Phone: 225-239-7796 Leo S. Butler Senior Center 950 Lorri Burgess Ave. Baton Rouge, LA 70802 Phone: 225-344-6775 Pearl George Senior Center 4000 Gus Young Ave. Baton Rouge, LA 70802 Phone: 225-389-3188 Perkins Road Senior Center 7122 Perkins Rd. Baton Rouge, LA 70808 Phone: 225-302-9662
Baton Rouge, LA 70802 Phone: 225-383-5551 *Sharlo Terrace I & II 4915 Alvin Dark Dr. Baton Rouge, LA 70802 Phone: 225-346-0215 *Turner Plaza Apt. 4546 North St. Baton Rouge, LA 70806 Phone: 225-923-8114
Baton Rouge, LA 70805 Phone: 225-389-5464
Dumas House Senior Center 1313 North Sherwood Forest Baton Rouge, LA 70815 Phone: 225-388-5646
East Baton Rouge Council on Aging (Main Office) 965 N. 18th Street, Baton Rouge, LA 70802 Phone: 225-923-8000 Fax: 225-923-8030 ebrcoa.org | info@ebrcoa.org Intergenerational Center | The Ageless Circle 3820 Gus Young Ave. Baton Rouge, LA 70802 Phone: 225-330-4966
Lotus Rides Line: (225) 361-0299 transport@ebrcoa.org
@ebrcoa . @ebrcoa73 . @ebrcoa 73 . ebrcoa1973
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