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Working With Older Adults Essay

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When you are speaking about older adults, what does the word vulnerable mean? This is the ability of an individual to respond to stressors due to predisposing factors. (Bales, McDonald, Porter Starr, 2015). “Today, 40 million people in the United States are ages 65 and older, but this number is projected to more than double to 89 million by 2050. Although the “oldest old”—those ages 85 and older—represent only 15 percent of the population ages 65 and older today, their numbers are projected to rise rapidly over the next 40 years.” (Bureau, 2011). Having worked with older adults for quite some time, the need for food security is one of the questions that stands out the most. Older adults are already in need for more medical, physical and more services than any other population. If you add food insecurity to the equation it intensifies the needs for all of those services. There are links to social conditions that are linked to physiologic and psychological changes when it comes to the complex phenomenon such as aging. (Garry, Guigoz, Vellas, 1996).
The distinct strengths with working with older adults is that they are not afraid to ask for what they want. They will go ahead and go into businesses and advocate for their needs. They will …show more content…

The Needs Assessment would allow you to put certain questions on it that would give you the knowledge you would need in regards to food insecurity with older adults. It can compare age, location and specific needs that each person may have. You can also get information about benefits for food, such as SNAP (Food Stamps) and how a lot of older adults may not even know that these services are available to them. Needs assessments can also give you a variety of information about how many people access food pantries, how many people lack the proper nutrients you need to have a “healthy”

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