Aging Matters: Reimagining Long-Term Care premieres Thursday, Jan. 27, at 8 p.m. and will also be available for streaming at pbs.org.
NPT and FiftyForward will present a free virtual preview screening and discussion of Aging Matters: Reimagining Long-Term Care Wednesday, Jan. 26, at noon, via Facebook Live. The public may RSVP for the virtual screening at wnpt.org/events.
Long-Term Care: Know Your Options, a panel discussion moderated by WPLN senior health care reporter Blake Farmer, premieres Sunday, Jan. 30, at 6:30 p.m.
The United States faces a rapidly aging population. People are living longer on average, yet they are not always living healthier – and 70 percent of people will need long-term care at some point during their lives. Despite this, a majority say they’ve done little to no planning for covering the costs of such care.
Aging Matters: Reimagining Long-Term Care surveys long-term services and support options available now, while looking ahead to how long-term care could evolve in the near future. One possibility is the Green House model, wherein a group of older adults live together in a house, sharing a kitchen and social spaces, with their own private bedrooms. There are more than 350 Green House homes across 32 states, including the Ave Maria development in Memphis.
Even those who are familiar with elder care may find themselves challenged by the demands of providing care. This is the situation Vickie Harris found herself in, despite her professional background in nursing home administration. “I had absolutely no idea of how complex that family caregiving role was and how it impacted an individual’s entire life,” Harris says in Aging Matters: Reimagining Long-Term Care. “It moved me from being a professional to being a daughter…I actually concluded that no one knew how challenged I was and that I was the equivalent of a tree falling in the forest; no one knew.” Harris is the founder and CEO of QEC Partners | Community ConneXor.
Aging Matters: Reimagining Long-Term Care also considers how to balance the care needs of older adults with their overwhelming desire to remain in their homes and communities as long as possible. In addition, the documentary presents ways to support paid and unpaid caregivers. Adult day services, for example, provide a respite for caregivers and important connections for seniors. “The benefits of interacting with so many different people, as opposed to one in-home caregiver, are really great,” Gretchen Funk, chief program officer at FiftyForward, says in the documentary.
This latest Aging Matters documentary is introduced by Grammy-winning singer-songwriter Kathy Mattea and narrated by Denice Hicks of the Nashville Shakespeare Festival. The Aging Matters series is made possible by the generous support of the West End Home Foundation, the Jeanette Travis Foundation, The HCA Healthcare Foundation on behalf of Tri-Star Health and Cigna. Additional support was provided by Jackson National Life Insurance Company and the Community Foundation of Middle Tennessee.
Additional broadcast times for Aging Matters: Reimagining Long-Term Care on NPT are Saturday, Jan. 29, at 5 p.m. and Sunday, Jan. 30, at 1 p.m. on NPT2. Long-Term Care: Know Your Options, the panel discussion, re-airs Saturday, Feb. 5, at 5 p.m. and Sunday, Feb. 6, at 1 p.m. on NPT2.