McMaster Toolkit on Working with Older Adults

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McMaster Toolkit on Working with Older Adults

Additional resources for the McMaster Toolkit on Working with Older Adults program.

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Attitude

Video
Meeting the Health Care Needs of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Older Adults
This online webinar discusses prominent health care needs of LGBT seniors, and how they may be different than heterosexual seniors including effects of economic, social, and environmental determinants of health.
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Video
Ageism towards Older Adults
This brief yet thorough video explains the four sociological tiers of ageism, and provides information regarding cultural views on age.
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PDF Document (External)
Health Literacy
This brochure explains the prevalence of health literacy and methods for recognizing and addressing it in order to encourage client-centered practice. It addresses how assumptions are often made as to a clients’ character when they mismanage medication or miss appointments, but it may actually be due to their poor health literacy.
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Web Link
Continuing Mobile Education
This resource provides a short presentation that interviews geriatricians to suggest skills for improving effective communication with seniors.
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Web Link
The ETHNICS Mnemonic: Clinical Tool, Didactics, and Small Group Facilitators Guide
This resource provides a culturally sensitive checklist of questions for health professionals to understand where clients currently stand with their diagnosis/perception of events, and knowledge of the health system.
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Video
Challenging Medical Ageism: A Path to Better Health
The founder of the Radical Age Lab talks about medical ageism in this video. It provides examples of common medical ageist comments and consequences, how this affects evidence-based practice, and how medical needs can be missed based on ageist thinking.
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Comfort

Web Link
Ethics and the Chronic Pain Stigma in Geriatric Populations
This audio clip addresses stigma and beliefs surrounding chronic pain in our society.
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PDF Document (External)
Talking with your Older Patient
This creative handbook focuses on health care perceptions in various ways (Views of clinicians, aging, and values about health).
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PDF Document (External)
World Alzheimer Report 2012 - Overcoming the stigma of dementia
The World Alzheimer Report provides background on stigma and dementia.
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Web Link
Physicians Promote Successful Aging
This article addresses the differences between objective and subjective aging.
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PDF Document (External)
Delirium, Dementia, and Depression: What's the Difference
A handout that will help differentiate delirium, dementia, and depression in older adults.
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PDF Document (External)
A Guide to End-of-Life Care for Seniors
This guide to end of life care presents of overview of the issues related to end of life for seniors.
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PDF Document (External)
Sexuality and Aging
This quick and easy to read fact sheet addresses relevant issues pertaining to sexuality of older adults.
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General Resources

Web Link
Shared Decision Making
This educational video module is on shared decision making with older adults.
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Video
So, Who's Making the Decision?
An interprofessional, person-centred approach to the care of the older adult.
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Video
Ask Me 3®
Ask Me 3 is a patient education program designed to improve communication between patients and health care providers, encourage patients to become active members of their health care team, and promote improved health outcomes.
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Web Link
Improving Communication With Older Patients: Tips From the Literature - Family Practice Management
Poor communication with this vulnerable and growing population can undermine your efforts to provide good patient care.
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Web Link
Elder Abuse | Geriatric Foundations
This module trains participants to identify risk factors and signs of elder abuse, collaborate with interdisciplinary teams, and utilize community resources to effectively prevent and respond to abuse in older adults.
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Inclusiveness

PDF Document (External)
Improving Medication Adherence in Older Adults: What Can We Do?
This resource provides a quick overview on identifying which patients in the geriatric population are at risk for medication mismanagement, how to assess for medication adherence, and strategies for dealing with medication non-adherence.
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PDF Document (External)
Medication and Non-Adherence in the Older Adult
Although not restricted to older populations, medication non-adherence is a multifactorial phenomenon often overlooked in developing care plans for patients.
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PDF Document (External)
What matters most in end-of-life care: perceptions of seriously ill patients and their family members
Initiatives to improve end-of-life care are hampered by our nascent understanding of what quality care means to patients and their families.
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PDF Document (External)
Can the Patient Decide? Evaluating Patient Capacity in Practice (Article)
Physicians assess the decision-making capacity of their patients at every clinical encounter.
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PDF Document (External)
Decision Making and Dementia (Article)
Decision-making in the context of dementia can pose an interesting challenge to the health care professional.
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PDF Document (External)
E-Ageing: Rehabilitation Module
This article follows the journey of Mr. Tanner, a patient recovering from a recent stroke, and explores the multidisciplinary approach to care in a rehabilitation centre.
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PDF Document (External)
Improving Hospital-To-Home Transitions for Older Adults with Complex Health and Social Needs in Ontario
This evidence brief aims to inform deliberations that could help to improve the quality and experience of hospital-to-home transitions for older adults with complex health and social needs (and their caregivers) in Ontario.
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Non-verbal Communication

Web Link
MLREMS Continuing Mobile Education - Communication
Short videos going over tips for working with some common communication issues faced by HCPs working with the elderly. Goes over hearing impairments, aphasia, and how to communicate respectfully.
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PDF Document (External)
Module 1: Communicating with Older Adults
A learning module that offers some good “do’s and don’ts” of communicating with elderly patients.
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Video
Patience, Listening, and Communicating with Aphasia Patients
Video works through some stories of people with aphasia, followed by suggestions for HCPs from patients, families, and their care providers (tips start at 8:00). Goes through important distinctions between aphasia, dementia, and deafness that people don’t always realize.
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PDF Document (External)
Beyond Words: older people with dementia using and interpreting non-verbal behaviour
The “findings” and “discussion” section offer valuable insight into the ways older adults with dementia communicate nonverbally, and how these behaviours can be interpreted.
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Web Link
Improving Communication with Older Adults: Tips from the Literature
This is a short article listing suggestions to improve the quality of communication with elderly patients. It gives tips for verbal and non-verbal communication, as well as organizational changes that can facilitate interactions with older adults.
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Verbal Communication

Web Link
The Fountain of Health Website
This website presents emphasis on changing how we think about aging.
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Video
The Fountain of Health
This website presents emphasis on changing how we think about aging.
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PDF Document (External)
Falls: General Information
This PDF provides information for patients on how to talk to their doctor about concerns they may have about their risk of falling and includes tips on how to avoid falls, potential signs to look for, and modifications that could be made to decrease risk.
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Web Link
Western Australian Centre for Healthy Ageing: E-Ageing Modules
An interactive tool to guide healthcare students in interdisciplinary, patient-centered interviewing with older adults over a variety of scenarios.
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Video
Meeting the Health Care Needs of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Older Adults
At the 30min mark, this thought-provoking presentation offers strategies for respectful communication, and how many common questions health care practitioners use (e.g. “Do you have a husband?” “Are you married?”) may make LGBT seniors uncomfortable with disclosing health information.
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