A Picture Tells A Thousand Words

By Michael Hodin

On my return to business travel — a plane ride, hotel stay, meetings around a conference, meals, and real people, yes, real people — I had the good fortune to do it at the 2022 American Society on Aging (ASA) conference. There were about 2,000 of us at the Hyatt Regency in New Orleans. And of the hundreds of sessions, several stand out for powerfully reflecting that now, in the second decade of our 21st century, and the second year of the WHO/UN Decade of Healthy Ageing, this backwater mega-trend of aging has come into its own. It left me optimistic, even enthusiastic, and very hopeful that we’re getting a few things right.

Let’s start with the session featuring Shutterstock, which is jumping in front in the huge task of combatting ageism. Most exciting is the company’s partnership with ASA itself — our host organization that is infused with new leadership and energetic and exciting ideas — that figured out if we could reimagine and reframe the images all of us rely on for conveying our ideas — what Shutterstock does — there could be a sea-change. Shutterstock is on it! And, together, ASA and Shutterstock have developed guidelines for image choice based on the notion that an older person in our 21st century might have different dreams, hopes, and aspirations than our 20th century parents and grandparents. They might look different, too! Moreover, the basic Shutterstock initiatives in this space, to create a fund for older artists to portray their views on aging is a model for all of us, even as it realistically represents aging itself. Wow.

Also at the ASA, their new CEO and President, Peter Kaldes, who cut his eye teeth as an economic and trade expert in the Obama National Security Council, is bringing new ideas and energy to ASA. This, not least, resulted in ASA help crafting several open sessions on equity and innovation. If you were lucky enough to stop by the resource center on the second and third day of the conference, you would have been treated to how aging is being reframed in many different areas:

· Healthy vision to unlock equity throughout the life course. Jeff Todd, President and CEO of Prevent Blindness, joined me to discuss the central role of healthy vision for healthy aging and health equity throughout the life course. We explored the emerging digital health innovations, research breakthroughs, and policy solutions to help all Americans, no matter where they live, reduce the burden of vision loss — more than 80% of which is preventable.

· A stronger foundation for bone health. In this conversation on bone health, Claire Gill, CEO of the Bone Health and Osteoporosis Foundation (and, by the way, founder of the Menopause Foundation) and I turned to the actions the U.S. and others globally can take to address osteoporosis and avoid preventable fragility fractures. Bone health is a major enabler of activity, independence and health as we age, yet for far too long osteoporosis has been assumed as a “normal” part of aging. In part because of this ageist assumption, preventable fragility fractures have been steadily rising, leading to devastating consequences for older adults and huge costs for health systems — some $52 billion in the U.S. alone, growing to $95 billion in a couple decades on our current course. To change that trajectory, we need new definitions, metrics, and care approaches that prioritize the role of bone health, proactively screen for and treat osteoporosis, and empower people to protect their bone health for active, fulfilling, independent aging. I’m also certain the Shutterstock initiative will help as their images can turn from the 20th century old white guy hunched over with a cane to a 21st century version where all of us could be working, remaining active, and having fun even as we age.

· Innovation as the driver of healthy aging for all. From COVID-19 vaccines to oncology advances to treatment of HIV/AIDS or CVD, the major health advances of the past four decades have innovation at their core. Together with Jason Sterne, Associate Director of Policy Advocacy and Alliances at Gilead, we examined how new health innovations, supported by smart policy approaches, can deliver on new health needs as people age to 100 as a matter of course. Most importantly, governments must approach spending on healthy aging as an investment, not a cost — leading to widespread benefits and greater equity for all people, regardless of their health conditions, age, or socioeconomic status. A global message for the WHO Decade of Healthy Ageing brought to us from new Orleans ASA Equity Session.

Surely one of the most powerful milestone moments of the conference was when Seth Sternberg, CEO and co-founder of Honor, announced a new platform, called Honor Expert, which will provide answers to people’s questions about healthy aging through a toll-free number and online chat. Honor Expert has already enlisted major national partners like Amazon and Best Buy — welcome to the Aging mega-trend — to connect older adults and their families with resources, tools, products, and services for all aspects of healthy aging. We will all be able to target wellness and nutrition to care planning and home management. If Honor Expert provides a first-of-its-kind platform for aging needs, Seth Sternberg made it absolutely clear that such profound tech-based innovations for elder caregiving are only possible because of the new Honor-Home Instead company, resulting from Honor’s purchase last Fall. Omaha-based Home Instead is the global leader in elder home care whose brilliance and successes in high level standards for personal touch are now being linked with Honor’s tech genius. High Touch and High Tech is the basis for reforming long term care across the globe. Seth and his collaborator at Home Instead, CEO Jeff Huber, are unlocking value for all of us.

What I took away from this years’ ASA was not only a renewed, reinvigorated and energized ASA organization, but one that brings the best of innovation and creativity with hopes, dreams, and aspirations for a healthier and more active aging for all of us. At the 2022 ASA conference, it was immensely encouraging to see the range of ideas and solutions that are poised to deliver critical advances for our aging world in a way that also helps put this mega-trend at the top of our public agenda where it belongs. Good for people and great for family, community, and national budgets.