The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has amended its public health guidance, allowing fully vaccinated people to exercise and attend small gatherings outdoors without wearing a face mask, reports CNBC News . People who are 14 days removed from their last vaccine dose can exercise alone or with other household members outside without a face covering, as well as congregate outdoors with a small group of other fully vaccinated people, or a mix of fully vaccinated and unvaccinated people. Dining unmasked at an outdoor restaurant with friends from multiple households is also allowed, although fully vaccinated people should still wear masks at outdoor spaces where the risk of COVID-19 is more uncertain — including sporting events, concerts, and parades. "CDC cannot provide the specific risk level for every activity in every community, so it is important to consider your own personal situation and the risk to you, your family, and your community before venturing out without a mask," the agency recommended.

A new study published in Geriatrics used machine learning (ML) algorithms that can analyze naturalistic driving data and identify mild cognitive impairment (MCI) and dementia in drivers, reports New Atlas . The researchers say such methods could be used to detect early signs of dementia using either a smartphone application or devices incorporated into car software systems. The researchers employed data from the Longitudinal Research on Aging Drivers study, which monitored nearly 3,000 older drivers for up to four years, diagnosing 33 subjects with MCI and 31 with dementia. A series of ML models were trained on this data. "Based on variables derived from the naturalistic driving data and basic demographic characteristics, such as age, sex, race/ethnicity, and education level, we could predict mild cognitive impairment and dementia with 88 percent accuracy," said Columbia University's Sharon Di. While age was the lead variable for detecting MCI or dementia, a number of driving factors closely followed, including "the percentage of trips traveled within 15 miles 24 km of home . . . the length of trips starting and ending at home, minutes per trip, and number of hard braking events with deceleration rates equal or greater than 0.35 g." The models could still predict drivers with MCI or dementia with 66 percent accuracy from driving variables alone.

Upstate Medical University is looking for patients with moderate to severe Alzheimer's disease as participants in a new clinical trial of a well-established blood pressure medication in helping patients with disruptive behavior, reports Syracuse.com . The Prazosin for Disruptive Agitation in Alzheimer's Disease (PEACE-AD) study will investigate whether prazosin can help Alzheimer's patients who have disruptive agitation because of the disease. Upstate's Nappi Longevity Institute is participating, with the work coordinated by the Alzheimer's Disease Cooperative Study. The nationwide clinical trial is seeking 186 participants, including five to 10 from Upstate. The 16-week trial involves 13 visits, and participants must be living at home with a full-time caregiver and have been experiencing disruptive behaviors for four weeks. They will be required to take a daily medication, have blood pressure monitored with a provided device, and answer a series of behavioral questions.

The U.S. National Institute on Aging and the Alzheimer's Association have backed a research tool based on three biomarkers for dementia prediction called the AT(N) framework — A for amyloid, T for tau, and (N) for neurodegeneration — reports News-Medical . New research published in Alzheimer's & Dementia: The Journal of the Alzheimer's Association suggests a subset of people classified by this tool as having the highest risk for dementia will not develop the condition in their lifetime. The investigators used data collected by the Adult Changes in Thought study, which has tracked more than 5,500 older volunteers to identify new cases of dementia, of whom about a third allowed post-mortem studies of their brains. The autopsy results for amyloid, tau, and neurodegeneration were used to approximate AT(N) classification five years prior to death. While 67 percent of volunteers with the proxy A+T+(N)+ profile developed dementia in the next five years, 33 percent did not. If validated with AT(N) biomarkers, these findings imply that any drug trial using the AT(N) framework will demand many more participants to be screened to enroll enough people to realize statistically solid results. "The AT(N) framework is valuable because it places living people on the spectrum of Alzheimer's disease neuropathologic change, which will allow us to better study the concept of resilience to this pathology and encourage the development of additional biomarkers necessary for the accurate prediction of who will go on to develop dementia," concluded the University of Washington's Caitlin Latimer.

A study published in the Journal of the American Geriatrics Society found listening to music before bedtime can significantly improve the sleep quality of older adults, reports UDiscoverMusic . Older adults who listened to music enjoyed significantly better sleep quality than those who did not. Those who listened to sedative music, which is characterized by a slow tempo, soft volume, and smooth melody, exhibited more improvement in sleep quality than those who listened to rhythmic music. "Based on psychophysiological theory, listening to sedative music can improve sleep by modulating sympathetic nervous system activity and the release of neuroendocrine levels of cortisol, thereby lowering levels of anxiety and stress responses," the researchers said. Studies have indicated that 40 percent to 70 percent of older adults have sleep problems. "Music intervention is an effective strategy and is easy to administer by a caregiver or healthcare worker," the researchers noted. "Music therapy might be the first line of therapy to recommend in older adults with sleep disturbances, which would reduce the need for or dependence on sedatives and sleeping medication."

AARP Chief Executive Jo Ann Jenkins recently penned a letter to President Biden that he and his administration should continue to back policies that will help older Americans afford lifesaving medications as prescription drug prices continue to increase. "Alarmingly, one out of three Americans do not take their prescriptions as prescribed because they cannot afford the medicine," she wrote. Jenkins' letter comes as both Democratic and Republican congressional lawmakers are reviving updated legislation to reduce the cost of prescription drugs. Biden is scheduled to address a joint session of Congress on April 28 to tout his American Families Plan, but it remains uncertain whether the plan will include any of the healthcare proposals he supported during his campaign. Jenkins urges policies that would allow Medicare to negotiate the price of drugs, particularly brand-name products, and also cap what beneficiaries pay out of pocket for their medications in the Part D prescription drug program. Medicare enrollees take between four and five prescription medications each month, on average. AARP reports that the price of the most widely used drugs rose at twice the rate of inflation in 2018, a pattern of price hikes exceeding inflation that has continued for more than 10 years. "These reforms would make a huge difference in the lives of Americans over the age of 50, who too often have to choose between taking their medicine and paying their bills," Jenkins concluded.

A coalition of Democratic U.S. senators has reintroduced a proposal to lower the qualifying age for Medicare from 65 to 50, reports Yahoo! Finance . "When it comes to providing affordable healthcare for every American, there is more we must do right now to change the status quo, improve our healthcare system and lower costs," said bill co-sponsor Sen. Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis.). Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) noted at a press conference that this revision could be life-changing for millions of Americans. Meanwhile, a recent Stanford University study found diagnoses of certain cancers are disproportionately higher among persons 65 and older, compared to those 64 and younger, and determined that "many people are delaying their care for financial reasons until they get health insurance through Medicare." In addition, a 2019 University of Michigan survey found more than a quarter of adults approaching retirement have little to no confidence that they will be able to afford health insurance over the next year, while 45 percent have little to no confidence that they will be able to afford health insurance once they retire. Yet both Republicans as well as more conservative Democrats are likely to oppose any changes to the state-sponsored health system.

A new study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association claims that people who develop type 2 diabetes before they turn 60 could double their chance of developing dementia in old age, reports the Daily Mail . The authors examined medical records from 10,095 people in Britain over an average of 32 years each from 1985 to 2019. They estimated that dementia at age 70 was twice as likely if someone had been diagnosed with diabetes a decade earlier, while the risk was also elevated for people who got the illness in their 60s. For persons with no diabetes at age 70, the baseline risk of having dementia was 8.9 per 1,000 person-years, and that rate rose to 18.3 for people diagnosed at age 59 or earlier. People diagnosed with diabetes between 60 and 64 had a 49 percent higher risk than if they did not have diabetes, with a rate of 13 per 1,000 person-years. The study suggested years of irregular insulin and glucose sugar levels in the brain can contribute to the development of dementia.

The Progress News reports that five employees and one board member of the Shaw Public Library in Clearfield, Pa., have become "Dementia Friends" as part of an initiative to address the stigma and lack of understanding about dementia. The Dementia Friends program is designed to change people's perceptions of dementia by transforming how people think, talk, and act about the disease. About 400,000 Pennsylvanians are living with Alzheimer's and related dementias, and Dementia Friends Champions serve as volunteers who inform people about being a Dementia Friend in their communities. The Shaw Library group attended a one-hour information session hosted by local Dementia Friends Champion Julie Fenton, director of outreach with the Clearfield County Area Agency on Aging. "I was so pleased to see these individuals showing their support for those living with dementia by participating in the session and becoming 'Dementia Friends,'" Fenton said. "We need to create more dementia-friendly communities so that people affected by dementia feel understood and included."

FYZICAL Therapy & Balance Centers offer group classes in boxing designed by medical professionals to alleviate symptoms of Parkinson's disease in seniors, reports the Naples Daily News . Over half a dozen such centers are located in Southwest Florida. Parkinson's can cause skills that boxers rely on, including balance, hand-eye coordination, and mental focus, to degenerate. By forcing the body into a regimen that requires maximum effort, speed, strength, balance, and flexibility, programs like FYZICAL's Rock Steady Boxing may be "neuroprotective," and delay the progression of Parkinson's symptoms. Rock Steady Boxing offers courses not based on boxing ability, but rather the degree to which Parkinson's is affecting participants' daily activities. Certified instructors lead classes, which start with extensive warmups before participants rotate through a series of stations. Participants punch with both hands, while kickboxing is also included in the curriculum; balance, flexibility, strength, and endurance stations fill out the rotation. "It is very much a support group and an exercise class," said FYZICAL member Lee Accavallo.