September is Healthy Aging Month, focusing on the positive aspects of growing older and encouraging people to engage in activities that maintain their physical, social, mental, and financial health as they age. Healthy aging can look different across communities, including for people with disabilities. While people with and without disabilities experience similar age-related conditions such as increased risks of cardiovascular disease, diabetes, and arthritis; those aging with disabilities may face additional barriers to accessing activities and interventions that can help address those conditions. These can include limited access to fitness facilities and programs, limited mobility which can make physical activity difficult, and provider knowledge about how disabilities and aging interact.
Several current NIDILRR-funded research and development projects are working at the intersection of aging and disability, working to understand how one impacts the other, and developing interventions and technology to help people with disabilities in their aging path:
- Accommodation Expert Support System for Aging Well (ACCESS for Aging Well) develops and tests a dynamic assistive technology (AT) and accommodation system with web-based and mobile functionality that will help older adults with disabilities and their formal and informal caregivers and service providers work together to identify AT & accommodations that assist older adults with disabilities to continue to live in their community of choice.
- Aging Well with Disability: Successful Aging Among Individuals with SCI collects information related to aging with a spinal cord injury (SCI) to determine which factors are associated with happier and healthier lives throughout the aging process. This collaborative study is led by the Northern California SCI Model System, along with the Southern California SCI Model System and the Minnesota Regional SCI Model System. Learn how you can participate!
- Rehabilitation Research and Training Center on Aging Among Adults with Serious Mental Illnesses: Supporting Individuals to Live As Vibrant Elders in Recovery (RRTC – S.I.L.V.E.R.) focuses on enhancing late life for adults with serious mental illnesses. This includes understanding the community factors that contribute to health disparities among people with serious mental illnesses, identifying promising practices that protect older individuals with these conditions, and developing interventions to improve the health and community living.
- Technologies to Support Aging Among People with Long Term Disabilities (TechSAge) conducts advanced engineering research and development of innovative technologies, as well as training and dissemination efforts to advance understanding of, or enhance environments of, older adults with long term disabilities. Projects include understanding user needs, developing telewellness programs, integrating smart technology into homes, and falls monitoring and prevention, among others. Learn how you can join their Participant Registry!
- Understanding and Promoting Longevity After Spinal Cord Injury: A Mixed Methods Study of Participation, Employment, and Quality of Life and Aging and Participation After Spinal Cord Injury: Promoting Utilization to Enhance Community Outcomes focus on the long-term effects of SCI investigated by the team at the Medical University of South Carolina. These projects explore how community participation changes over time, and the critical events that impact participation. These projects use data collected over more than 50 years to learn how factors like employment, race and ethnicity, and other non-health factors affect long-term survival, and develop guidelines for active participation while aging with SCI.
You may also want to explore these resources developed by the grantee community and others:
- Impact: Feature Issue on Retirement and Aging for People with Intellectual, Developmental, and Other Disabilities – an issue of the Impact magazine from the RRTC on Community Living dedicated to life-changing issues facing older adults with intellectual and developmental disabilities such as retiring from employment, managing new health conditions, and staying active and engaged.
- Three webinars hosted by the Investigating Disability factors and promoting Environmental Access for healthy Living (IDEAL) RRTC focused on meeting the needs of people aging with disabilities in the community:
- Healthy Active Aging as an Older Adult blog from the National Center on Health, Physical Activity, and Disability features articles by older adults with disabilities on how they stay active and engaged in their communities.
Lastly, these articles from our Research In Focus series highlight research at the intersection of aging and disability:
- Adults Aging with Physical Disability Share How Their Surrounding Environment Affects Their Community Participation
- A Group Teleconference Program May Help People Aging with Multiple Sclerosis Build Resilience
- Healthy Lifestyles May be Linked with Longer Life Expectancy for People with Spinal Cord Injuries
- Long-Term Survivorship May Reduce Psychosocial Challenges for Adults Aging with Traumatic Spinal Cord Injury
- Older Adults Share What Helps Them Trust a Home Care Provider
- People Aging with Mobility Disabilities Share Common Challenges and Strategies for Success
- People Aging with Spinal Cord Injuries and Their Caregivers Share Experiences with Aging
- People with Long-Term Physical Disability Have a Lot to Share About Successful Aging