In this weeks news article it’s been highlighted that just a little exercise can help to improve our lifespan as we get older, we’ve heard a robot named Baxter could be in line to aid NHS shortages and Age UK has stated that mixing a variety of medicines can cause life-threatening harm.
Norwegian review of 36,000 cases links more activity with a lower risk of death
This study has helped to back up previous research that being more active, even just for a little bit can help to improve longevity in older adults.
“It is important for elderly people, who might not be able to do much moderate-intensity activity, that just moving around and doing light-intensity [activity] [will have] strong effects and is beneficial,” said Ulf Ekelund, a professor and first author of the study at the Norwegian School of Sport Sciences.
The study found that even a little increase in movement such as moving around the home more, washing dishes or gentle gardening can help. Which is a positive sign for those who might struggle with moving much.
Baxter is a robot ‘nurse’ that could help dress the elderly
To help aid NHS nurses a robot named Baxter has been developed by leading professors and PhD students at the Imperial College of London’s Personal Robotics Lab, with the main aim of helping to dress elderly patients. To relive nurses workload Baxter was developed to analyse a patients movement, if it deems they are suffering with their mobility, it can then help to dress them.
In places such as Japan, that has an increasing elderly population they have already introduced robotic assistance for older adults. SoftBank Robotics has a humanoid named Pepper, which is being used in Silver Wing Social Welfare Corp. nursing homes in Tokyo.
Older adults on a medley of medicine risk life-threatening harm according to The Guardian
It has been reported that in the UK around 2 million older people are on at least seven medications. This can cause interaction between the medicines, leading to potential side effects that could cause life-threatening harm.
According to the report more is not always better. It’s important to check with your doctor and reiterate all the medicines you are one when a new one is prescribed as this can sometimes be overlooked.
Age UK said medicines in many cases allow older people to live in better health. “We are incredibly fortunate to live at a time when there are so many effective drugs available to treat older people’s health conditions, but it’s a big potential problem if singly or in combination these drugs produce side-effects that ultimately do an older person more harm than good,” said Age UK’s charity director, Caroline Abrahams.
