Aging in Place Concept Helps People Age Gracefully

Aging gracefully can sometimes be a problem especially when the admission to nursing homes or assisted living facilities looms large. Marilyn Rantz, nursing researchers at the University of Missouri-Columbia calls this as a slippery slope and says that there is a way to prevent elderly people from getting onto this slope.

Consumers say they never want to go to a nursing home. I have never met anyone in a nursing home who says he or she really wants to be there. said Rantz, professor in MU’s Sinclair School of Nursing. I think there is a better way to do this. Towards this end, Rants is working on a new concept called Aging in Place. Rantz is director of TigerPlace, one of four Aging in Place pilot sites in Missouri, which offer elderly people a chance to live in their own apartments and not in nursing homes. For example, TigerPlace has apartments, which offer on-site fitness, meals, medical care, personal care services, wellness programs and more. The main aim is to keep people healthier and active and not put them under depression with the idea of nursing homes. Aging in Place provides services that people need in the privacy of their own homes while focusing on maintaining function and abilities until the end of life. In most cases, with this type of care, people wouldn’t need a nursing home, Rantz said, adding that more than 250 older adults had benefited from this. Rantz was recently conferred the Lifetime Achievement Award from the National Gerontological Nursing Association.