LIFE LONG LEARNING CAN HELP YOU LIVE LONGER BETTER
Knowledge is the elixir of life and it is consumed through learning
The proposal that everyone over 70, and people with long term conditions should stay at home and keep their physical distance has had a mixed response. Some people aged 70 have been indignant and of course they are right, in a way, because people aged 70, or indeed any age, differ from one another in many ways more than they resemble one another but they do share one thing , a failure to understand what is happening to them and the need to think differently about their future. There is also deep concern about the fact that although the rationale for shielding people over 70 from infection is understood decreasing the activity levels of people in their 70s and beyond, that is decreasing not only their physical activity but also because isolation will decrease their cognitive and emotional activity, could have major harmful consequences. we need LESS social distancing, while we do need physical distancing
The Optimal Ageing Programme was designed to reduce the need for social care, by preventing or delaying dementia, frailty and disability through life long learning The discussion about social care has depicted it as a tidal wave that just has to be funded but we now know that the need for social care be reduced because ageing by itself is not a major cause and the three other causes can be modified if people are given the right knowledge and the right level of support to change which they can do, whatever their age. This policy of isolation and staying at home, could have a harmful effect, but it could also do much more good than by simply reducing the risk of Covid infection; it could lead to the person using the period of time out to learn how to iIving longer better, just as if they were in a spa or healthfarm for twelve weeks
The Optimal Ageing Programme is working with Learning With Experts to launch the Life Long Learning programme for Living Longer Better and we see the 12 weeks of time out as the ideal time to make the investment to transform the way people think about and manage living longer to reduce their risk of dementia and frailty and therefore being dependent on the state or their family for the most intimate tasks - the condition that most people fear most
LEARNING HOW TO LIVE LONGER BETTER IN TWELVE WEEKS
Muir’s qualification to present the programme derives not only from his 49 years of study and work to improve the health of older people, for example he published the first ever book on prevention of the problems of older people in 1985, but also from the fact that he is precisely the type of person the policy is designed to protect. Being 75 and having had a heart attack and a stent in 2014 and having been brought up in the Glasgow fogs for 12years before the Clean Air Act of 1956 by parents who smoked players cigarettes he is just the type of person that the virus could affect very severely
The programme will run for 84 days from the 25th of March ; once a week there will be a briefing of about 8 minutes to explain what has happened, and what is happening, to us covering key topics
- Understanding ageing
- Closing the fitness gap
- Preventing and coping with disease, preparing for the new risk factors – isolation and loneliness
- Understanding and changing how people think about ageing
- Adapting to the changing brain and mind
- Improving strength
- Improving stamina
- Improving skill
- Improving suppleness
- Increasing brainability and reduce your risk of dementia
- The importance of purpose
We will provide the knowledge on how to use this time to develop a plan improve mental and physical wellbeing and live longer better. Examples of the topics to be covered are
- Brisk walking to improve stamina , eventhe PM said exercise was one of the essential reasons for going out
- The Great British Press-up Challenge; all men to be challenged to do the same number of press-ups as their age
- Death to slippers – how to create a birthday list that has trainers and weights rather than slippers and shawls
- Build your home gym
- How to stop your teeth falling out
- Never brush your teeth on two legs
- How life long learning is the elixir of life
- Increase your brainability, whatever your age
- Reduce your risk of dementia in three stages
- Design your daily 10 minute Triple S programme for strength suppleness and skill
- Spread your warmth – back the AgeUK campaign for people to donate their Winter Fuel payment to help more people get active
- Get even more involved in helping others and the planet
- Get online and help someone else get online
- Join a virtual group
- Try virtual reality
- Get a grip of your health information
- Challenge your doctor to prove all your medication is high value
- Reduce your risk of a bad death
Throughout the Lockdown Wellbeing Programme the learner would be preparing their Action Plan based on
- What he or she would like life to be like in their eighties and nineties and
- What they dread might and want to avoid happen and then
- make a plan with purpose