JOIN US for the Sunday Coffee Chat & Support Hour April 3, 2022!

The next Keeping it REAL Caregiving Sunday Coffee Chat & Support Hour is Sunday, April 3, 2022 @ 8:00 AM – 9:00 AM Pacific

11:00 AM – 12:00 PM Eastern

Join us for a powerful discussion about how we cope and move through loss and grief.

KIRC will be joined by our special guest, Toni Miles, MD, PhD, FGSA, Epidemiologist.

Dr. Miles is an advisor to eldercare initiatives including the CDC Healthy Brain, Georgia’s Alzheimer’s Task Force, and the John A. Hartford Foundation.

Based at the University of Georgia, Dr. Miles works with organizations to identify Best Practices in Bereavement Care.

One size does not fit all

I first met Dr. Miles in the fall of 2020, during a journalism fellowship program with the Gerontological Society of America.

At that time, I produced a story about the impacts of Covid-19 on our elders, especially how the virus was claiming the lives of so many in nursing homes and other long-term care facilities.

The depth of loss was and continues to be great. The AARP Nursing Home Covid-19 Dashboard reminds us of just how many individuals we have lost. Recent data puts the deaths from Covid-19 at close to150,000 here in the United States. Now, consider other causes of death which have claimed lives. We must always remember these are not just numbers. It is loved ones and family members.

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During our interview in 2020, Dr. Miles pointed out, that for each individual who dies, there are those left behind who are also impacted: spouses, children, siblings, and care workers.

So we must then consider:

How are all of those individuals coping with the loss?
In what ways is it impacting the ability to function and thrive?
What about children who have perhaps lost one or both parents?
Are we paying enough attention to the emotional toll of not only moving through Covid-19 deaths, but all kinds of loss?