Aging with Dignity and Assisted Living Centers

Recent studies suggest that more elderly people are hoping to forgo assisted living centers and assisted-living facilities in favor of living out their days in the comfort of their own home. A 2010 AARP survey found that nearly 90 percent of elderly people older than 65 want to “age in place,” or to live in their own home and community safely, independently and comfortably. While aging in place may be more achievable for healthy, active elderly people, elderly people with health issues are just as deserving of the independence and dignity that residing at home provides.

That’s where home health care comes into play. In-home health care solutions can serve as a less expensive and more personalized alternative to residential care features for elderly people. Learning about home health care solutions can help in making the decision if in-home solutions are suitable for you or a loved one. When people think of in-home care for elderly people, they are often thinking of two different kinds. True home health care involves the administration of healthcare services by trained doctors, said Timothy J. Colling, vice chairman of the San Marcos-based A Servant’s Heart Care Solutions. “Strictly speaking, ‘home health care’ is a term that is reserved in the law for the provision of healthcare solutions in a home setting,” Colling said. “What that comes down to (are) factors that a doctor, typically a health professional or a physician or physiotherapist, provides something invasive or technically tricky, like changing a sterile wound.”

“Home care” differs from “home health care” in that the caregiver’s focus is on helping their client with “activities and everyday living,” or ADLs. Because the home caregiver serves as more of a companion than an in-home health professional, he or she is not required to have the same training and certifications as a home health care counterpart. Many home proper care agencies provide both kinds of senior care, while others provide one of the other. But, it still stands that for elderly people with serious conditions, assisted living centers are still the go-to place for them.

Rise of Respiratory Therapists

When Santa Fe Community College graduate Marilu Herrera began working as a respiratory therapist at Presbyterian Rust Medical Center in Rio Rancho about 18 months ago, she gained a starting pay of about $24.40 hourly. That was more than her sister, who has a bachelor’s degree from the University of New Mexico, was making as a medical lab technician in those days. “I think, with an associate’s degree and as a respiratory therapist, you can start off pretty well,” said Herrera, who was not amazed to listen to that a new review declares that college learners who generate an associate degree often earn more money than those who have a bachelor’s degree, at least in the first year or two of work.

But Herrera’s sister has lately caught up to her in wage, another point made in the new research, “College Pays: But a Lot More for Some Graduates Than for Others.” The 47-page document, written by Mark Schneider, president of College Measures, uses data from five states, Arkansas, Colorado, Tennessee, Texas and Virginia, to track the earning power of school graduates. In three of the states, Colorado, Texas, and Virginia learners with specialized associate degrees like respiratory therapist, generate more in their first year of work than their alternatives with bachelor’s degrees. The review focuses on programs that are more remunerative than others. Graduates with health, engineering and business degrees are out-earning those with liberal arts degrees. And despite increasing dependency on STEM programs in educational institutions, the report indicates that the technology part of that plan does not pay off economically for those earning degrees in biology or chemistry. It hints that learners should focus on TEM and not STEM.

For example, Texas learners with specialized associate degrees gained an average of at least $11,000 more in their first season of employment than learners with bachelor’s degrees. Still, Schneider recognized that, gradually, learners with bachelor’s degrees gradually economically outpace those who only have associate degrees. Santa Fean Sarah Rodriguez-Aguilar, who is the clinical supervisor for the respiratory therapy department at Christus St. Vincent Regional Medical Center, is aware of that all too well. She gained her second associate degree from Santa Fe Community College and gained $20.18 an hour plus benefits when she began working at the medical center. But upon getting her bachelor’s degree via Pima Medical Institute, her wage increased by $5 an hour.

Senior Care and the Role of Lawmakers

Underfunded elderly care facility has been a major task to the senior care and state recently and will continue to be resolved in the future, many law makers and medical experts estimate. During the last session of the Minnesota Legislature, elderly care facility regulation was implemented, creating a 5 percent across-the-board increase. That activity by the Legislature showed the first increase in financing in the past five years. Nursing home employees have had their income freezing since 2008 and will now be seeing a rise in income come September 1, 2013. Rep. Jim Abeler, R-Anoka, said, of the $83 million it will cost for four years, $74 million was reprocessed out of the senior care facility market.

“Workers will see an increase, but it will come out of the other elderly care facility cash that was reprocessed,” Abeler said. “It’s like taking your wallet out of your right pocket and putting it into your left pocket and saying, ‘I’ve got some cash now,’” Abeler said. “The program is hungry for cash and we cannot give the people a good increase because of the demands about minimum salary,” Abeler continued. Abeler, last session, served as the ranking Republican on the Health and Human Services Finance Committee. He chaired the committee the two past years with Republicans being in authority control.

Gayle Kvenvold, president and CEO of Aging Services of Minnesota, said needs of assisted living facilities have not been effectively resolved by the Legislature and by others. The activity by the Legislature “was a step in the right direction and we are thankful for it, but our job is not done,” Kvenvold said. On the average, the distinction between what it costs to manage a senior is a deficiency of $28 per day, Kvenvold said. She said it will take more than one legal session to make up that difference. Aging Services of Minnesota is the state’s biggest organization of getting senior care services companies. Its account involves more than 1,000 participant companies such as 700-plus company participant sites. In cooperation with its members, the organization works with more than 50,000 care suppliers throughout the state and provides more than 100,000 elderly people each year in configurations across the continuum from their house to assemble real estate to assisted living to senior care facilities. Patti Cullen, president and CEO of Care Providers of Minnesota, said the legal activity in 2013 showed a significant improvement and is a “good start.”

College Composition CLEP

The College Composition CLEP examination analyzes ability as a writer trained in most first-year college composition programs. Hopefully this is restorative work for your student; motivate him to make his ability as a writer before he goes into college. Learners who successfully pass this examination will earn 6 college credits and save themselves 16 weeks of class time. But be sure to always check your individual college’s CLEP policy for variations in the number of credits granted and their CLEP course equivalency graph.

The College Composition CLEP examination contains 50 multiple-choice questions (50 minutes) and two timed essays (70 minutes). The first essay is based on the student’s own experience, studying or findings. The second article, according to the College Board, will require applicants to make a position by building an argument in which they synthesize information from two offered resources, which they must report. The Official CLEP Study Guide is a helpful source, offering sample articles and reviewing recommendations. Preparing for this examination will also help students get ready for other future articles such as those for consistent examinations (ACT/SAT), grants, and college entrance essays. It’s a win-win strategy to education, making the most use of his time.

In writing an essay, do not just avoid generalizations but make your composing more illustrative. “I stepped up to the counter and requested to talk with a manager.” Change it to: “I swaggered up to the counter and asked to talk with a manager.” Two terms modified, but the image colored is entirely different. “After including the substance to the little package, vapor started to come out the top.” It can be enhanced to: “After pouring sulfuric acid into the beaker, vapor started billowing out the top.” This one provides more detail, uses less terms and makes a vivid image. Use Adjectives and Adverbs occasionally.  “I was incredibly exhausted and my feet were very painful after finishing the complicated exercise.” How about: “I completed the 10-mile run exhausted and with cramped feet.” Use better nouns and verbs, not just toss in more adverbs and adjectives.

NLN and the Capacity for Nursing Education

The issue of expanding nursing education potential including staff, nursing resources and physical space to join and educate the scores of students needed to meet upcoming nursing demands remains critical. Responding to President Obama’s suggested price range, National League for Nursing CEO Dr. Beverly Malone indicated the League’s appreciation for the potential impact of this financing on the country’s health. “Federal financing is imperative to the formula between delivery of top quality nursing care services to the greatest number of People in America and nursing education. The Title VIII dollars asked for in FY 2014 for health professional employees development understands the reality that nursing staff are an extremely important component of our nursing care safety net.”

According to the NLN’s Annual Survey, demand for admittance to pre-licensure programs is constantly on the outstrip supply, with shortages of staff and nursing positions mentioned as the prime factors in constraining growth. Post-licensure, advanced degree programs, through which upcoming health professional teachers are prepared, have also revealed that adding staff would expand their acceptance potential.

Moreover, NLN research, mentioned in the administration’s suggested price range, verifies the need for more financing to support national and cultural community candidates to nursing programs in order to close the social gap between nursing staff and the different patient communities provided. It has been effectively demonstrated that wellness outcomes improve, in particular among under-served and financially deprived patients when care providers share their social outlook and background.

“The NLN is satisfied that the government Nursing Workforce Diversity Program will directly benefit from President Obama’s suggested Title VIII financing,” noted NLN president Dr. Judith Halstead. “The Group has long recommended diversity as one of its four core values driving the NLN mission to promote quality in nursing education to build strong and different nursing employees to advance the country’s health.”

What is Mathematics?

Mathematics is the study that focuses with the reasoning of shape, quantity and agreement. Statistics is all around us, in everything we do. It is the foundation for everything in our everyday life, such as cellular phones, architecture (ancient and modern), art, money, technological innovation, and even sports.

Since the beginning of documented history, mathematics development has been at the leading edge of every civil community and in use in even the most primary of societies. The needs of Mathematics appeared based on the wants of the community. The more complicated a community, the more complicated the mathematical needs. Primitive communities needed little more than the ability to count, but also trusted math to determine the position of the sun and the study of hunting.

Several societies in China, India, Egypt and Central America contributed to mathematics as we know it today. The Sumerians were the first people to create a counting system. Specialized mathematicians designed arithmetic, such as primary functions, multiplication, shape and rectangle origins. The Sumerians’ program passed on through the Akkadian Kingdom to the Babylonians around 300 B.C. Six millennium later, in the United States, the Mayans designed intricate schedule techniques and were experienced astronomers. About this time, the idea of zero was designed. As societies developed, mathematicians started to work with geometry, which determines areas and volumes to make angular dimensions and has many realistic programs. Geometry is used in everything from development to fashion and internal planning.

Geometry went side by side with algebra, developed in the 9th Century by a Persian math wizard, Mohammed ibn-Musa al-Khowarizmi. He also designed quick methods for multiplying and dividing figures, which are known as algorithms, a corruption of his name. Algebra provided societies a way to split inheritances and spend resources. The study of geometry meant mathematicians were fixing straight line equations and techniques, as well as quadratics, and diving into good and bad alternatives. Specialized mathematicians in the old days also started to look at a variety of ideas. With origins in the development of shape, number strategy looks at figurative numbers, the character of figures and theorems.

New Hospice Care

Two of the most terrifying words one wishes never to listen to are “terminal illness”, especially in regards to yourself or a family member. This is usually followed by a variety of confusing choices that need to be taken like the right doctor, hospice care, insurance issues and confounding medical terms, none of them easy or simple. Pearland-based Altus Healthcare Management Services is stepping in to complete the needs of the critically ill in Sugar Land by starting a new medical center with an in-patient unit in roughly 8 months.  The term “hospice” represents a support that provides medicines, equipment, medical center services and additional help, either in the comfort of your home or at an inpatient unit, when life span is about 6 months or less. Sufferers are referred by their doctors to a medical center and the support is usually covered by Medical health insurance.

Altus Health was established in 2004 with a novel idea of “empowering physicians”.  In short, it allows doctors to get and become associates at their facilities and once functional, doctors focus on practicing medication and looking after patients while ZT Wealth, manage the day to day management, promotion and cash management. Altus has had a good run starting several hospice care services, imaging, surgery and sleep facilities in Texas, utilizing over 800 individuals and producing $150 million of earnings. Altus’ strength can be found in being patient focused and making a plan of care that is designed to the unique needs of the patient and their family. This is supervised by a care group of experienced doctors who work in combination with the individual’s primary doctor to ensure that the patient gets the best possible care.

Former Mayor Dave Wallace, now a Board Member of Altus Healthcare, described by Gaj as “one of the best individuals to have in your corner”, said he was grateful of the tasks the service would make and the healthcare it would offer for the citizens of Sugar Land.  “Detractors may grumble that the wheels of the Government are not turning quick enough,” Wallace said, yet I believe that the “City of Sugar Land is the best oiled machine there is.”

Humanities Problems

What can we do to make the case for the humanities? Compared with the STEM professions (science, technological innovation, engineering and mathematics), they do not, on the surface, contribute to the nationwide protection. It is challenging to evaluate accurately, their impact on the GDP, or our employment rates or the stock market. And yet, we know in our bones that luxurious humanism is one of the biggest resources of durability we have as a nation and that we must secure the humanities if we are to maintain that durability in the millennium forward. When you ask economic experts to chime in on a problem, the odds are great that we will eventually get around to a primary question: “Is it worth it?” Assistance for the humanities is more than worth it. It is important.

We all know that there has been a reasonable quantity of anger to this concept lately in the Congress and in State Houses around the nation. Sometimes, it almost seems as if there is a National Alliance against the Humanities. There are regular potshots by radio experts and calling to decrease federal funding in education and scholarship in the humanities. It has become stylish to attack the government for being out of contact, swollen, and elitist; and humanities financing often strikes experts as an especially muddle-headed way of federal funding. Because of this, the humanities are in risk of becoming even more of a punching bag than they already are.

In the present economy, these strikes have the potential to move individuals. Any expenses have to be clearly worth it. “Performance funding” hyperlinks federal support to professions that offer high number of jobs. Or, as in a Florida proposal that appeared last year, a “strategic” educational costs framework would basically cost more cash to learners who want to study the humanities and less cash for those going into the STEM professions. As an outcome, there is severe cause for problem. Government support for the humanities is going in the incorrect route. In the fiscal year 2013, the National Endowment for the Humanities was financed at $139 million, down $28.5 million from FY 2010, at some point when science financing remained mostly unchanged. This is part of a design of long-term decrease since the Reagan years.

Earning a Degree thru Credit by Exam

When Erick Dillard made the decision to get his online bachelors degree from Excelsior College back in 2002, he was working and raising two children. He didn’t have the luxury of going to school full-time, and he wanted to get his degree on his schedule. The 48-year-old Army veteran made the decision to test out of some of his online course specifications. By the time he completed it, he would save lots of money and obtained credit for 15 courses in his strategic communications degree, all without getting the formal classes. “I would come home and study all night and all evening,” says Dillard, who sometimes completed two courses a month through credit by exam.

Earning a degree doesn’t always have to be a huge time or investment decision. Progressively, older students like Dillard are speeding up their education and cutting expenses by using programs that award credit for past learning, says Pam Tate, chief executive and CEO of the Council for Adult and Experiential Learning. Earning credit by exam can be a great choice for adults who have already learned the course material through previous jobs or military experience, experts say. And it can be a particularly eye-catching choice for online students, who enjoy versatility and who are acquainted to a regimented, self-guided approach to learning.

“It’s popular” among online students, says Bill Stewart, associate vice chairman for Institutional Advancement at Excelsior College, which allows students to test out of class. “And some individuals use them to a significant degree and some individuals use them to complete holes in their specifications to meet their degree.” The idea of examining out of school courses is not a new idea. The College Level Examination Program, applied through the College Board, started giving students the choice to get credit for a range of programs in the late Sixties. When students take one of the 33 CLEP assessments, such as chemistry or American literary works, they are first provided a list of information they should understand before the evaluation. It’s up to the student to track down research materials and prepare for the analyze, which expenses about $80 plus a examining fee.

“We are realizing that some of the biggest on the internet colleges, like Thomas Edison State College, have a very strong cohort of exam-takers,” says Suzanne McGurk, senior assessment administrator at the College Board. “I think that really resonates with online students who are used to doing things at their own speed.”

National League for Nursing Ongoing Litigation with ACEN

The National League for Nursing declared that the New York Supreme Court judgment regarding the lawsuit with ACEN (formerly NLNAC), maintaining the NLNs place on the ongoing lawsuit (Supreme Court of the State of New York, NY County, Index No. 651744/2011, Hon. Anil Singh, Supreme Court Justice). The Judge decided that NLNAC (ACEN) did not have the power to change its own bylaws and Articles of Incorporation as it tried to do in April 2013. Through this action, the NLNAC commissioners were trying to eliminate the NLN as the major participant of NLNAC, thus relegating the Group to a Class B member without any purposeful privileges.

In a second beneficial ruling for the National League for Nursing, the Judge declined NLNACs demand to void the standing agreements that were decided by the NLN and NLNAC more than 10 years ago. What this judgment indicates is that NLNAC owes the monies due the League under the conditions of the contract. These resources have been organized in escrow since June of 2011.

In making this statement, President Judith Halstead, PhD, RN, FAAN, ANEF, reiterated the Leagues’ commitment to enhancing new certification solutions. The NLNs certification solutions will be occupied with the Leagues’ primary principles of caring, reliability, diversity and excellence; and fulfill Department of Education requirements as well as the needs of nursing and nursing education. Added National League for Nursing CEO Beverly Malone, PhD, RN, FAAN, our objective to develop the health of the country cannot be obtained without a dedication to the best nursing education possible. The new accreditation department will help accomplish that objective.

Dedicated to quality in nursing, the National League for Nursing is the leading organization for health professional staff and management in nursing education. The NLN offers staff development, networking opportunities, testing services, nursing research grants and public policy projects to its 37,000 individuals and more than 1,200 institutional members, including nursing teaching programs across the spectrum of higher education and nursing care organizations.