National

Montana

National

Administration on Aging

The Administration on Aging (AoA) has developed a gateway to assist the national aging network in understanding and implementing the 2006 Amendments to the Older Americans Act (OAA). By using the AoA Gateway, a person can go directly to those Amendments of the OAA that are of special interest. In addition, if you have questions/input regarding the 2006 Amendments, you may submit them at the Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) page. Questions that are relevant to specific situations will be referred to the appropriate area agency on aging (AAA), State agency on aging, or Regional Office of the Administration on Aging for response.

American Association of Retired Persons (AARP)

AARP is a nonprofit, nonpartisan membership organization for people age 50 and over and is dedicated to enhancing quality of life for all as they age. AARP provides a wide range of information, benefits, special products, services and advocacy.

Ask Me 3

Nothing -- not age, income, employment status, educational level, and racial or ethnic group -- affects health status more than literacy skills. That's why clear communication between patients and health care providers is critical. Good communication = healthy patients. Ask Me 3 has resources for health care providers, patients, large-scale implementers and the media.

CancerCare

CancerCare - CancerCare is a national nonprofit organization that provides free, professional support services to anyone affected by cancer: people with cancer, caregivers, children, loved ones, and the bereaved. CancerCare programsincluding counseling and support groups, education, financial assistance and practical helpare provided by professional oncology social workers and are completely free of charge. Founded in 1944, CancerCare provided individual help to more than 100,000 people last year, in addition to the more than 1 million unique visitors to the website.

Cargivers Medline Plus

Caregivers Medline Plus is a trusted health information service of the National Library of Medicine and the National Institutes of Health.

Caregivers are people who take care of other adults, often parents or spouses, or children with special medical needs. Some caregivers are family members; others are paid. They help with:

  • Food shopping and cooking
  • House cleaning
  • Paying bills
  • Giving medicine
  • Going to the toilet, bathing and dressing
  • Eating
  • Providing company and emotional support

Comprehensive Unbiased Senior Living Information

This site was designed to provide comprehensive and unbiased information to seniors and caregivers searching for senior living options and senior care. We have gathered information from state and federal sources, then combined it with public information to provide a complete resource for seniors and caregivers.

Family Caregiving

Family Caregiving is one of the many resources offered on eXtension, an interactive learning environment delivering the best, most researched knowledge from the smartest land-grant university minds across America. eXtension connects knowledge consumers with knowledge providers - experts who know their subject matter inside out.

eXtension is unlike any other search engine or information-based website. It's a space where university content providers can gather and produce new educational and information resources on wide-ranging topics. The Family Caregiving Community of Practice builds on the tradition of land-grant university extension programs working with partners by creating, including, and/or linking to educational resources for family caregivers. Extension faculty and staff at the local, state, and national level have worked cooperatively with a number of national partners in developing a comprehensive web resource for caregivers.

FDA for Seniors

Foundation for the Future of Aging

The Heinz Family Philanthropies is adding a new series to its Facts About project entitled "10 QUESTIONS TO ANSWER..." About Long-term Care. The 10 Answers will provide the most up-to-date, concise, accurate, and unbiased information related to important issues about long-term care.

Long-term care encompasses a variety of medical and non-medical services provided to persons with chronic diseases or disabilities who need assistance with activities of daily living like dressing, bathing, and using the bathroom. Long-term care can be provided at home, in the community, in assisted living communities, or in nursing homes.

Health Information Literacy, Medical Library Association

The Medical Library Association (MLA) is a nonprofit, educational organization of more than 1,100 institutions and 3,600 individual members in the health sciences information field, committed to educating health information professionals, supporting health information research, promoting access to the world's health sciences information, and working to ensure that the best health information is available to all. The MLA has been developing resources for both health professionals and health consumers under a "Health Information Literacy Research Project" funded by the National Library of Medicine.

Health Literacy, American Medical Association

In 1998, the American Medical Association (AMA) became the first national medical organization to adopt policy recognizing that limited patient literacy affects medical diagnosis and treatment. The AMA Foundation has since been working to raise awareness of health literacy through development of toolkits, patient safety monographs, patient safety tip cards, reports and other resources.

Health Literacy Discussion List, National Institute for Literacy

Health Literacy Discussion List, National Institute for Literacy - The National Institute for Literacy's moderated discussion list on Health Literacy serves as a forum to facilitate dialogue about the latest literacy research and its applications to instructional practice; promising policies and practices; and to promote the exchange of ideas, resources, and experience. The goal is to enhance professional development for educators and practitioners through ongoing opportunities to learn, discuss, and reflect on critical literacy issues. List participants are expected to conduct their communications in a spirit of inquiry, curiosity, and mutual respect. Participants on the lists should follow Netiquette Rules athttp://www.nifl.gov/lincs/discussions/list_guidelines.html#netiquette before posting messages.

Health Literacy Improvement

Health Literacy Innovations

Health Literacy Innovations (HLI), a privately-held company headquartered in Bethesda, Md., creates innovative tools to enhance health literacy. Knowing that "literacy" is the single most important indicator of a health outcome, HLI was established to develop tools to quell medical mistakes and confusion due to low health literacy. In 2007, with the entire health care industry as its target market, HLI launched the Health Literacy Advisor (HLA), the nation's first interactive health literacy software tool. Today, with more than 300 users of all skill levels using the HLA to simplify consumer health information, HLI continues to streamline the health literacy review process replacing inefficiency and high costs, with technology, efficiency, and knowledge. HLI believes if it can empower communicators to create, produce, print, display, share, and advertise clear health information, it can help to improve health care outcomes one word at a time.

Health Literacy Month

Stories are another powerful way to make an emotional connection with health literacy. That's the reason why this year's Health Literacy Month initiative gathered nearly 40 stories about why health literacy matters. These stories are told in a variety of ways (written essays, audio podcasts, songs, and photo slideshows) and come from many points of view (including that of providers, patients, students, teachers, parents, community leaders, librarians, and web developers).

These stories are yours to use to make a compelling case why health literacy matters. Here's a link, http://www.healthliteracy.com/hlmonth_stories.asp

Health Literacy Resource List for Educators

Healthy Aging for Older Adults, CDC

The Healthy Aging Program (HAP) serves as the focal point for older adult health at CDC, and establishes programs, develops innovative tools, and provides a comprehensive approach to helping older adults live longer, high-quality, productive, and independent lives. HAP collaborates with other CDC programs, such as those focusing on injury prevention, disability prevention, and adult immunizations, as well as key external partners. Through health promotion and disease prevention, CDC has the opportunity to improve health and quality of life for older adults, and to slow the expected growth of health care and long-term costs for this and future generations.

HealthyPlace

HealthyPlace - is the largest consumer mental health site on the Internet. HealthyPlace provides authoritative information and support to people with mental health concerns, along with their family members and other loved ones. At HealthyPlace you will find comprehensive, authoritative information on a comprehensive list of mental health conditions and their treatments. HealthyPlace believes that the most important thing in a person's life is "peace of mind".

HHS HealthBeat

HHS HealthBeat is a federal initiative launched on July 11, 2005. This web-based service provides health promotion and disease prevention tips 5 days a week in audio and text formats.
Check out all the 2009 health news topics listed so far in 2009 at: http://www.hhs.gov/news/healthbeat/2009/index.html

Improving Health Literacy

This Guide has been created for the health professional who wants to:

  • Improve communication with patients and others
  • Teach themselves or other health professionals about health literacy and clear communication

The guide is a work-in-progress. New links are added several times a week. Organization changes are driven by new discoveries.

Please become an active participant in the effort to improve health communication by helping us improve this site. Use the comments capability to add your thoughts and criticism. You can help make this a better resource.

Innovators' Guide to Navigating CMS

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) oversees a budget of approximately $450 billion serving over 45 million beneficiaries. One of the most important goals for CMS has been to make "the best of modern medicine" available to Medicare beneficiaries. This guide is intended as a general summary to assist stakeholders in understanding the processes used to determine coverage, coding, and payment for new technologies under the Medicare fee-for-service program.

Medical Words: A Tutorial from the National Library of Medicine

This tutorial teaches about medical words and how to put together parts of medical words. In addition the tutorial has quizzes so that users can see what they have learned. Users will need a Flash Player to view the programs.

Medicare Coverage Database

The searchable Medicare Coverage Database (MCD) contains all Medicare National Coverage Determinations (NCDs), National Coverage Analyses (NCAs), Local Coverage Determinations (LCDs), and local policy articles. The Medicare Learning Network (MLN) has produced a How To booklet (2.5 MB), that provides an explanation of the MCD, as well as how to use the Search, Indexes, Reports and Downloads features. The How to Use the Medicare Coverage Database booklet (November 2009) can be located athttp://www.cms.hhs.gov/MLNProducts/MPUB/list.asp on the MLN Publications page. Use search key words how to to locate this publication quickly. Understanding the search tool is the best way to find the information for which you are looking!

http://www.cms.hhs.gov/MLNProducts/downloads/MedicareCvrgeDatabase.pdf

Medicare Learning Network (MLN)

The Medicare Learning Network (MLN), located in the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), is a brand name for official CMS national provider education products designed to promote national consistency of Medicare provider information developed for CMS initiatives. The Network plays a key role in furthering the Agency's culture of responsiveness. The MLN uses a variety of mechanisms, such as the Internet, national educational articles, brochures, fact sheets, web-based training courses, and videos, to deliver a planned and coordinated provider education program. The Network uses these different mechanisms to provide educational opportunities that accommodate the healthcare professional's busy schedule, with the least amount of disruption to normal business functioning. The goal is to provide timely, easy-to-understand educational materials to accompany the release of new or revised Medicare Program policies.

My Family Health Portrait - A Tool for the Surgeon General

Using My Family Health Portrait you can:

  • Enter your family health history.
  • Create drawings of your family health history to share with family or health care worker.
  • Use the health history of your family to create your own.

Talking with your health care worker about your family health history can help you stay healthy!

National Academy on an Aging Society (NAAS)

National Academy on an Aging Society (NAAS) - the NAAS aims to provide clear and unbiased research and analysis focused on public policy issues arising from the aging of America's and the world's population. The goal of our research is to enhance the quality of debates about the challenges and opportunities of an aging population by presenting findings from the policy and academic communities in language aimed at the general reader.

National Alliance for Caregiving

The National Alliance for Caregiving is dedicated to providing support to family caregivers and the professionals who help them and to increasing public awareness of issues facing family caregivers.

National Association of State Units on Aging

National Association of State Units on Aging - the National Association of State Units on Aging (NASUA) was founded in 1964 and is a non-profit association representing the nation's 56 officially designated state and territorial agencies on aging. The mission of the NASUA is to advance social, health, and economic policies responsive to the needs of a diverse aging population and to enhance the capacity of its membership to promote the rights, dignity and independence of, and expand opportunities and resources for, current and future generations of older persons, adults with disabilities and their families. NASUA is the articulating force at the national level through which the state agencies on aging join together to promote social policy in the public and private sectors responsive to the challenges and opportunities of an aging America.

National Council on Aging

National Council on Aging - The National Council on Aging (NCOA) is a non-profit service and advocacy organization headquartered in Washington, DC. NCOA is a national voice for older Americans - especially those who are vulnerable and disadvantaged - and the community organizations that serve them. The mission of NCOA is to improve the lives of older Americans. The following core values guide NCOA's work on behalf of older Americans: (a) social and economic justice; (b) respect and caring for all; (c) innovation; and, (d) excellence and integrity.

National Family Caregivers Association

The National Family Caregivers Association educates, supports, empowers and speaks up for the more than 50 million Americans who care for loved ones with a chronic illness or disability or the frailties of old age. NFCA reaches across the boundaries of diagnoses, relationships and life stages to help transform family caregivers' lives by removing barriers to health and well being. NFCA's core Caring Every Day messages are: Believe in Yourself. Protect Your Health. Reach Out for Help. Speak Up for Your Rights.

The National Interfaith Coalition on Aging (NICA)

The NICA provides practical guidance in addressing the central role spirituality plays in the lives of senior adults. Clergy and lay persons from various faiths add to NICA's network to study and advance the role of spirituality in the aging process. The Coalition is a diverse network of national religious bodies and other related organizations and individual members (e.g., social workers, parish nurses, etc.) which promotes the spiritual well-being of older adults and the preparation of persons of all ages for the spiritual tasks of aging. NICA serves as a catalyst for new and effective approaches to spiritual growth in aging through research, networking opportunities, resource development, service provision, and dissemination of information.

NIH News in Health

The National Institutes of Health (NIH) plays a major role in finding better ways to diagnose, treat, cure or prevent diseases. The practical health information in NIH News in Health is reviewed by NIHs medical experts and based on research conducted either by NIH's own scientists or by our grantees at universities and medical schools around the country. Material published in NIH News in Health is not copyrighted. We encourage you to reprint our articles and illustrations in print or web publications. Please acknowledge NIH News in Health as the source.

NIHSeniorHealth

NIHSeniorHealth makes aging-related health information easily accessible for family members and friends seeking reliable, easy to understand online health information. This site was developed by the National Institute on Aging (NIA) and the National Library of Medicine (NLM) both part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH). NIHSeniorHealth features authoritative and up-to-date health information from Institutes and Centers at NIH. In addition, the American Geriatrics Society provides expert and independent review of some of the material found on this web site. Each health topic includes general background information, open-captioned videos, quizzes and frequently asked questions (FAQs). New topics are added to the site on a regular basis.

NIH SeniorHealth Toolkit for Trainers

NIH SeniorHealth Toolkit for Trainers - the Toolkit for Trainers is a resource developed by the National Institute on Aging for helping older adults search for health information online. Anyone can use the free, easy-to-use training materials to help older adults find reliable, up-to-date online health information on their own. The training features two websites from the National Institutes of Health --NIHSeniorHealth.gov and MedlinePlus.gov. Trainers can use the toolkit with beginning and intermediate students of the Web.

Powerful Tools for Caregivers (PTC)

POWERFUL TOOLS FOR CAREGIVERS (PTC) is an educational program developed by Legacy Health System's Caregiver Services, that provides family caregivers with the skills and confidence to better care for themselves while caring for someone with a chronic illness. PTC consists of six 90 minute or 2-1/2 hour classes co-led by trained facilitators who employ a standardized curriculum where caregivers learn how to:

  • Better manage stress
  • Communicate effectively with friends, family & healthcare providers
  • Cope with difficult emotions
  • Take better steps to care for themselves

Program of All-inclusive Care for the Elderly (PACE)

The Program of All-inclusive Care for the Elderly(PACE) model is centered around the belief that it is better for the well-being of seniors with chronic care needs and their families to be served in the community whenever possible. PACE serves individuals who are age 55 or older, certified by their state to need nursing home care, are able to live safely in the community at the time of enrollment, and live in a PACE service area. Although all PACE participants must be certified to need nursing home care to enroll in PACE, only about seven percent of PACE participants nationally reside in a nursing home. If a PACE enrollee does need nursing home care, the PACE program pays for it and continues to coordinate the enrollee's care.

Quality of Care for Frail Elders

The Picker/Commonwealth Fund Program on Quality of Care for Frail Elders aims to transform the nation's nursing homes and other long-term care facilities into resident-centered organizations that are good places to live and work, capable of providing the highest-quality care. The projects it supports aim to:

  • identify, evaluate, and spread models of resident-centered care, or care delivered in accordance with the needs and desires of the people who live in nursing homes;
  • equip nursing home operators to lead transformational change; and
  • promote policy options that support resident-centered care.

Questions Are the Answer - Get More Involved With Your Health Care

Clinicians, the Government, and many other groups are working hard to improve health care quality, but improving health care quality is a team effort. You can improve your care and the care of your loved ones by taking an active role in your health care. Ask questions. Understand your condition. Evaluate your options. Do you know the right questions to ask? Check out the top ten questions to ask.

Rosalynn Carter Institute for Caregiving

The Rosalynn Carter Institute for Caregiving (RCI) was established in 1987 on the campus of Georgia Southwestern State University (GSW) in Americus, Georgia. The RCI was formed in honor of former First Lady Rosalynn Carter, an alumna of GSW, to enhance her long-standing commitments to human development and mental health. The RCI works to establish local, state and national partnerships committed to building quality long-term, home and community- based services. A major focus of the RCI is supporting individuals and caregivers coping with chronic illness and disability across the lifespan as well as limitations due to aging.

Montana

Brilliant Aging!

My mission is to provide program approaches and tools that reveal myths about aging, overcome age bias in health promotion and healthcare, and encourage individuals to make conscious choices about aging well in body, mind and spirit. I want to help people write their own story about aging well through the full lifespan. I want to change negative perceptions about aging. As a wellness professional and someone who has always been very physically active, I was stunned at the powerful impact negative aging stereotypes had on my own expectations and behavior.

Read more about Kay Van Norman's efforts to reframe the aging experience so people can age with vitality and purpose in body, mind and spirit.

The Montana Geriatric Education Center (MTGEC)

The Montana Geriatric Education Center (MTGEC) The Montana Geriatric Education Center (MTGEC) has an overall purpose to provide geriatric education and training for Montana health professionals, higher education faculty, and health professions students so that they might better meet the needs of the increasingly aged population of this state. Programming continues to be developed and refined for a variety of health professionals including nurses, pharmacists, physical therapists, physicians, physician assistants, and social workers.

Montana Gerontology Society (MGS)

The Montana Gerontology Society (MGS) is dedicated to enhancing professional development and understanding among providers of services, seniors, volunteers, researchers, educators, students, and others associated with the field of aging. The MGS was formed in 1982 by a group of professionals, volunteers and educators in order to provide opportunities for individuals interested in gerontology to share common concerns and ideas. MGS is governed by a 12 member Board of Directors elected by the membership

Montana Senior and Long Term Care Division

Montana Senior and Long Term Care Division The Montana Senior and Long Term Care Divison has a mission to advocate and promote dignity and independence for older Montanans and Montanans with disabilities by:

  • Providing information, education, and assistance;
  • Planning, developing and providing for quality long-term care services; and
  • Operating within a cost effective service delivery system.

The division administers aging services, adult protective services, and the states two veterans' homes. It also helps to fund care for elderly and disabled Montanans who are eligible for Medicaid and Supplemental Security Income (SSI).

 

Updated: 06/14/2011 11:39:49