Seniors Site

The old guy went to his doctor to find out the result of his lab tests. "I’ve got good news and bad news," the doctor said.

"Give me the good news first," the patient replied.

"The good news is that you have only 24 hours to live."

"What!" the patient blubbered. "If that’s the good news, what’s the bad news?"

"I forgot to call you yesterday."

Al Gore, Rush Limbaugh and Bill Gates are on an airplane together and crash. They’ve just gone through the gates of Heaven, and God is sitting on a great white throne. God addresses Al Gore first.

"Al, what do you believe in?"

Al replies, "Well, I believe that the combustion engine is evil and that we need to save the world from CFCs and that if any more freon is used, the whole earth will become a greenhouse and we’ll all die."

God thinks for a second and says, "Okay, I can live with that. Come and sit at my left "

God then addresses Rush Limbaugh. "Rush, what do you believe in?"

Rush Limbaugh replies, "Well, I believe in the free enterprise system, I believe that our leaders should be people of high moral character, and I believe that any philanderer who raises our taxes should rot and burn in hell."

God thinks for a second and says, "Okay, fine. Come and sit at my right."

God then addresses Bill Gates. "Bill, what do you believe?"

Bill Gates says, "I believe you’re in my chair."

In a recent study conducted by a group of Dutch researchers, brightening the lights for elderly people with dementia plus a daily dose of a sleep hormone, melatonin, will improve their mood, sleep and overall well being.

According to the study, the patients that they observed showed remarkable improvements in the quality of their lives. There were less reports of stress and depression among the patients. There was a 19 percent reduction of depressive symptoms and it made their brains more sharper.

These researches are great because even if there is no accurate cure for dementia, elders can live a life with less depression and pain. I hope that more studies will be conducted in order to help the seniors cope up with life even if they have dementia.

The heat of the sun is something that bothers a lot of people especially the senior citizens. It will often hinder them from going out or doing their household tasks. When it is hot, most of them would rather sit down and do nothing at all. However, if it is too much, then basically, they have nothing else to do.

It is a good thing that in Pittsburgh and Allegheny County, the senior citizen centers are open until evening to provide air conditioned relief for those who are 60 years old and above. This is a great way for them to escape the heat.

Here is a list of the centers who are open until evening.

Homewood Senior Center, 7321 Frankstown Ave., open until 7 p.m.

Primetime Senior Center, 440 Lincoln Ave., Bellevue, open until 5:30 p.m.

Seton Center, 1900 Pioneer Ave., Brookline, open until 8:30 p.m.

Sharpsburg New Images Senior Center, 209 13th St., open until 8 p.m.

South Side "Market House" Senior Center, 12th and Bingham streets, open until 7 p.m.

Tarentum Highlands Senior Center, 704 Second Ave., 0pen until 8 p.m.

A mental status test is given to help determine the state of a person’s mental health. In this case, it is pretty helpful to seniors who are patient’s of Alzheimer’s disease. This will help professionals in gauging the mental progression of the disease.

The following are what comprises in a mental status test according to the United States National Library of Medicine:

1. Checking the physical appearance including the way patients dress and groom themselves.
2. Checking the patients’ orientation and awareness. They check if they know their address, complete name and phone number, current date and the current season of the year.
3. Checking the length of attention span, the short-term and the long-term memory.
4. Determines the patients’ abilities which may include problem solving skills and judgments.
5. Checking the patients’ ability to distinguish and identify objects and recall words.

Criminals often find seniors as soft targets. Not anymore. In Kingston, Harry Kopenis, a 71 year old senior citizen chased, tackled and caught 22 year old, Erin Vanmatre after knocking him down and taking his $100 after withdrawing at an ATM machine.

Kopenis was with his friend who was in an electric wheel chair and they both caught the criminal. Kopenis held her legs, his friend held her hand. The agile senior citizen blurted out strong words, "Senior citizens aren’t an easy prey." All the while, Erin thought that the old man could not get to her but then, he proved her wrong.

Sprung with pure energy and adrenaline rush, Kopenis locked her legs after a short chase and held on to her until such time that the police arrived. She will be facing charges of harassment and robbery and is now locked up with a bail of $10,000.00.

I have never seen a man so dedicated to his craft for such a long time and still plans to go further despite the known hazards for his health. His name’s Mohamed Adnan Osman, a native of Malaysia and a senior citizen clocked at 66 years of age. He is going for a 9,000 kilometer journey from Malaysia to China on bicycle. He will be spending a lot of time site seeing before going back home on the 27th of August.

He targeted a total of 80 days to complete the journey which covers Thailand, Laos and Vietnam with China as his last leg. He has only bare gearing and equipment and his hopes rely solely on people who will come along the way to give him hospitality and shelter.

One of his main goals is to promote Malaysia as a great tourist destination through the rest of his expedition. Another goal that he cited was the fact that he wants the youth to know that age does not matter whenever you have the will to pursue your dreams. He would want to instill in the minds of the youth that they must have the right kind of spirit and passion to go for their dreams.

A new study suggests that there is a new drug that was developed by Kyowa Pharmaceutical that helps Parkinson’s disease patients. This drug that they are currently examining is called Istradfeylline. It works by helping nerve and brain signals bypass the damaged dopamine system in the brain which in turn leads to Parkinson’s.

The study shows that it is effective as an add on therapy to other drugs that are used to treat Parkinson’s disease. It improves the off time in about 90 percent of patients according to their investigations and tests. It is a novel drug approach to the said disease. Usually, Parkinson’s is treated with domapine but then, it wears off after some time. The drug will connect with receptors aside from dopamine to open some communications with the brain.

According to the researchers, this drug and other agents in the same class that work in other areas of the brain are an important step forward when treating patients who experience the wearing off phenomenon and side effects that are related to those of dopamine drugs.

There was a recent finding that shows that there is an antioxidant found in green tea that appears to prevent the development of amyloid fibrils which is a toxic protein that is associated with Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s disease.

The Amyloid plaque can be seen in the brains of Alzhemier’s patients which is known to disrupt the function of cells. Many studies aim to prevent the development of amyloid plaque in order to prevent and treat Alzheimer’s disease.

Just recently, a German team found out that the tea antioxidant called epillocatechin gallate has an anti-plaque ability. Hopefully, as they push the study a little further, Alzheimer’s disease will be treated with greater accuracy.