The Survive and Thrive Boomer Guide

AARP launches interactive map on top-rated hospitals across America

A new interactive map listing the top-ranked hospitals in the U.S. by geographic area is available from AARP The Magazine.

Compiled by Consumers’ Checkbook, a nonprofit organization, the listing is available online on the magazine’s Web site.

Consumers’ Checkbook surveyed doctors from across the country and collected 140,000 ratings of hospitals in the doctor’s communities. Checkbook also asked the doctors whether and where they’d recommend patients seek care in other communities for extremely difficult cases of heart conditions, cancer, and other ailments.

The list will help guide patients to appropriate hospitals if they decide they need to travel outside their hometown for care, AARP said in a statement announcing the launch of the interactive map.

When asked where they were most likely to send patients with difficult cases, doctors surveyed by Consumers’ Checkbook named the following hospitals:

Heart, General

• Cleveland Clinic, Cleveland, Ohio

• Mayo Clinic, Rochester, Minn.

• Children’s Hospital Boston, Boston, Mass.

• New York-Presbyterian/Columbia, New York, N.Y.

• Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, Mass.

• Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Boston, Mass.

• The Johns Hopkins Hospital, Baltimore, Md.

• Stanford University Medical Center, Palo Alto, Calif.

• Texas Heart Institute at St. Luke’s Episcopal Hospital, Houston, Texas

Cancer, General

• The University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, Texas

• Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, New York, N.Y.

• Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Boston, Mass.

• Mayo Clinic, Rochester, Minn.

• City of Hope, Duarte, Calif.

• The Johns Hopkins Hospital, Baltimore, Md.

• Duke University Hospital, Durham, N.C.

• Roswell Park Cancer Institute, Buffalo, N.Y.

Mystery Diagnoses

• Mayo Clinic, Rochester, Minn.

• Cleveland Clinic, Cleveland, Ohio

• The Johns Hopkins Hospital, Baltimore, Md.

• Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, Mass.

• Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center, Los Angeles, Calif.

Neurosurgery

• Duke University Hospital, Durham, N.C.

• Mayo Clinic, Rochester, Minn.

• University of California San Francisco Medical Center, San Francisco, Calif.

• Cleveland Clinic, Cleveland, Ohio

• Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, Mass.

• The Johns Hopkins Hospital, Baltimore, Md.

• Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center, Los Angeles, Calif.

Eyes

• Bascom Palmer Eye Institute, University of Miami, Miami, Fla.

• Wills Eye Institute, Philadelphia, Penn.

• Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center, Los Angeles, Calif.

• Wilmer Eye Institute, The Johns Hopkins Hospital, Baltimore, Md.

The survey is part of the research for a book from Consumers’ Checkbook called “Consumers’ Guide to Hospitals,” which uses volumes of government safety statistics and data on death and complication rates, along with survey results, to compare and rank hospitals in the country’s 53 largest metro areas.

To see the interactive map of Consumers’ Checkbook’s top 125 hospitals, visit www.aarpmagazine.org/health.

Copyright 2009, Rita R. Robison, Consumer Specialist

Silvers Summit addresses technology needs of baby boomers as they grow older

Among the throngs of thousand attending the 2009 International Computer Electronics Show to ogle the latest electronic gadgets, one group will be focusing on how technology can help baby boomers as they age.

At the Silvers Summit tomorrow from 8 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. at the Venetian Hotel in Las Vegas, speakers will offer information on products and services for the boomer generation. The keynote speakers will be Lynn Mento, senior vice president of membership for AARP, and Eric Dishman, director of Intel’s Digital Health Group.

Other speakers include:

• Majd Alwan, director of the Center for Aging Services Technology

• Mary Furlong, Boomer entrepreneur and visionary

• Don Jones, vice president of health and life sciences at Qualcomm

• Dr. Gary Small, professor of psychiatry and co-author of “The Memory Bible”

• Peter Cullen, Microsoft’s Trustworthy Computing Group

• Mike Takemura, director of the Accessibility Programs Office at Hewlett Packard

• Jerry Shereshewsky, CEO of Grandparents.com

• Curt Stone, director of the QoLT Foundry and Industry Liaison at Carnegie Mellon University

• Howard Byck Sr., senior vice president of lifestyle products and services for AARP Services

The Silvers Summit Showcase and display area, offering exhibits of a variety of technologies for boomers to use in the digital age, is underway at the Sands Convention Center through Sunday, Jan. 11.

Among the exhibitors in three categories are:

Brain and Body Fitness

HeartMath. Offers an em-Wave device to reduce stress, a special variation on biofeedback techniques.

Dakim. Helps people of any age keep their brain stimulated and active.

Posit Science. Takes a different approach to brain exercise by targeting auditory processing, memory, and visual processing.

Generation One. Offers hardware with features to deliver reminders, care, and other medical and care-giving functionality.

Accessibility

Clarity. Offers a Life phone, a special cell phone built for senior needs.

ClearSounds Communications. Provides a variety of sound-enhanced and high dB gain products for boomers, seniors, and caregivers.

Hewlett Packard Accessibility. Offers products for the boomer home of the future, with a senior PC and innovative-touch panel PCs.

Living at home longer

Continua Health Alliance. Certifies telehealth products.

MedSignals Pill Phone. Helps seniors stay in touch with caregivers by providing a variety of services such as medicine notification.

On the Horizon. Develops products such as special GPS services and a screen that adjusts its type to an individual’s eyes.

For more information, see the Silvers Summit Web site.

Copyright 2009, Rita R. Robison, Consumer Specialist

Help available for baby boomers selecting nursing homes for family members

The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services has launched a new rating system for nursing homes. The five-star rating system made its debut yesterday.

Newspapers across the country responded with articles on whether nursing homes in their cities or states were among the highest or lowest rated.

This is helpful information for boomers to use when they need to select a nursing home for family members.

Other useful tips include:

“How to Select a Nursing Home” – eHow

“How to Choose a Nursing Home: The ‘Do’s’ of Due Diligence” – AARP

Copyright 2008, Rita R. Robison, Consumer Specialist

What boomers need for an emergency

With so many hurricanes and natural disasters in the news, it’s important to think through what you’ll need if a disaster strikes your area.

Among the emergencies that boomers and their families may need to be prepared for include earthquakes, power outages, extreme heat, fires, floods, hurricanes, landslides, thunderstorms, tornadoes, tsunamis, winter storms, and extreme cold.

First, develop a family emergency plan, including a plan for how to communicate with family members if an emergency arises. Determine what kinds of disasters are most likely to occur in your area and how you’ll be notified.

The American Red Cross has an emergency contact card that you can print out so that each member of the family can carry one with them.

Next, buy or assemble emergency supply kits that will provide enough supplies for each family member for three days. This will reduce anxiety and make you and your family more comfortable when emergencies occur.

Kits can be purchased from the Red Cross, big-box retail outlets, sporting goods stores, REI, and other organizations. Prices range from $35 to $200, depending on the number of people and days they’ll serve.

If money is tight, you can make your own kit. Select a bag and put water, clothing, a blanket, walking shoes, nonperishable food, a flashlight, tools, first aid kit, glow sticks, medication, a radio, and other supplies in it.

Check your emergency kit every six months. You’ll need to rotate food and medication in the emergency kit so it doesn’t become outdated.

Be sure you have an emergency kit in your car.

Third, create an emergency file. After you’ve organized your important papers, make copies of whatever you consider vital in case of an emergency. After compiling these copies, place them in a file marked Emergency Information. Place the file in a file box with a handle. Put the box in a closet where you can grab it if you need to leave in a hurry.

Avoid the use of candles during an emergency. In Miami, a family whose mobile home survived hurricanes Charley and Frances lost their home to a fire when winds fanned the flames from a candle. They had no homeowners insurance.

You should have at least one traditionally wired landline phone, as cordless or cellular phones may not work in an emergency.

You also need to find out about emergency plans at places where your family spends time: work, nursing home, and school.

Be sure you also learn about the emergency plans that have been established in your area by your state and local government.

See the Office of Homeland Security’s Web site, Ready.gov for additional information.

More people say they’ve done some preparation for an emergency since 9-11, according to the National Preparedness Month’s Blog.

• 58 percent of Americans say they’ve done something to prepare for emergencies.

• 53 percent have created an emergency management plan.

September is National Preparedness Month.

Copyright 2008, Rita R. Robison, Consumer Specialist