Northwestern Health Sciences University is working with the Volunteers of America of Minneapolis, Minn., to provide more accessible natural health care to the elderly in the community. Volunteers of America has provided $150,000 to Northwestern’s Wolfe-Harris Center for Clinical Studies to produce a one-of-a-kind project, focusing on the organization’s services for the elderly. According to Roni Evans, MS, DC, dean of research at Northwestern, this is more of a demonstration project versus a research study. She says, “The primary goal is to determine the feasibility of developing a sustainable and replicable model for providing integrated chiropractic, acupuncture and massage services for Volunteers of America’s elderly residents.”
According to Dr. Evans, the integrated services will be offered to elderly residents with varying degrees of impaired physical and mental function. Some of the residents are in transitional care and are expected to return to their own homes; others are in assisted living, long-term care, or memory care. “We would like the Volunteers of America residents to experience an increased function and quality of life through our services,” says Dr. Evans.
According to the United States Government Census Bureau, by the year 2030 nearly 25 percent of the United States population will be age 65 or older, while the population of citizens ages 85 and older is expected to triple in the next 40 years. Dr. Evans explains, “The older society gets, the greater their health care needs become.
The preparations for the project began in September 2008, placing chiropractic, acupuncture and massage fellows in the Volunteers of America facilities.
The fellows involved are: Lori Baldwin, LAc; Deanna Benson NCTMB; Cara Borggren, DC; Corrie Vihstadt, LAc; Jodell Skaufel, DC; and Kristine Westrom, MD.
Included in the process is: Establishing doctors’ orders, developing methods for sharing information and documenting services, and identifying resource needs. This needs to be done before services are offered to the residents. Dr. Evans says, “There is so much potential for natural health care professions to meet the needs of the elderly and, through integration with other health professions, establish a greater role in the larger health care system.”
Mark Zeigler, DC, president of Northwestern, says, “I am excited about the opportunity to work with Volunteers of America. I look forward to what this can mean to our profession when the project is done.”
“Everybody is working very hard so that we can begin offering services to Volunteers of America residents by the end of January 2009,” says Dr. Evans. There are several things to be accomplished before services are offered. According to Dr. Evans, “Among the most important is learning more about the Volunteers of America’s facilities and how we may best help them meet their needs in caring for their elderly residents. We look forward to expanding chiropractic, acupuncture, Oriental medicine, massage services, and practice-based research in more facilities in the future."
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