Source: USA TODAY

Martha Stewart has rallied her fans to partake in hundreds of projects over the years, raising the bar on cooking, entertaining, gardening, decorating, collecting, crafting — and more crafting.

In her new book, Living the Good Long Life: A Practical Guide to Caring for Yourself and Others, Stewart arms herself with a team of specialists, including several of the nation’s best geriatricians, to reshape a more somber landscape. The entertaining and home decorating maven, self-made entrepreneur, philanthropist and recent grandmother of two insists “successful aging” be gracefully performed in the intrepid manner undertaken by her mother and grandparents.

“They all lived into their 90s and were healthy and vital people until shortly before they died,” says Stewart, 71. “I’ve always been interested in their longevity and in other parts of the world where people are healthy. I always wonder what they’re doing to stay healthy.”

She sought the counsel of many experts for the comprehensive book, including her personal trainer, yoga instructor, chiropractor and doctors at Mount Sinai Hospital in New York, where she established a center for geriatric health, The Martha Stewart Center for Living, in 2008, a year after her mother died.

True to her passion for minutiae, tons of charts, tips and recipes adorn the pages. At the book’s core: her “10 Golden Rules” for staying physically, mentally and socially fit. They range from eating well and staying fit to connecting with others and “staying curious.”

“When you’re through changing, you’re through,” she says.

Why conquer this topic now? The season (a season always beckons in Stewart’s books and magazines) is upon us, she says.

“Because the Baby Boomers are all coming of age, there is a giant (health) problem looming,” says Stewart. “My book can tell people how to take care of oneself in every possible way so you can live well and healthy for a long time. If disease does hit you, and it will eventually, the book has sections on how to let it not define you.”

Her mother, Martha Kostyra, died when she was 93, but stayed strong until shortly before she died, even appearing on Stewart’s television shows at her daughter’s side. That’s how taking care of yourself pays off, says Audrey Chun, physician and director of the Mount Sinai geriatric center.

“Lengthening the functional good time people have is the role of geriatrics,” says Chun. “The life Martha’s mother led, so active, so full of helping everyone out, and compressing the morbidity at the end of life” is the philosophy Stewart’s book aims to inspire.

In the book’s introduction, Stewart writes that at age 71, she doesn’t think about age much at all, “because there is so much to do, so many things to accomplish, and so much to look forward to.”

Readers of the monthly calendar in her magazine, Martha Stewart Living, know it’s jammed. But there’s apparently room for more: She announced last week on the Today show that she’s put her profile up on Match.com, an online dating site. Her book is even cited in her profile: After writing it, she says, “I was reminded how central good relationships are to happiness and longevity.”

A big part of the care plan is to follow a Mediterranean-type diet, often prescribed to patients with cardiovascular disease to improve heart health. It consists of leafy green vegetables, whole grains, legumes, fruits, fish and olive oil. Red meat and processed foods are rarely eaten.

Did adopting this diet require some arm twisting — given Stewart’s baking and entertaining books have recipes deliciously rich in both calories and fat?

“Not at all,” she says. “I’ve always tried to eat healthy. I grow just about everything I eat. I’m not a fanatic about it all. Everyone is going to eat a piece of cake now and then.”

“But things have to be done in moderation,” she adds. “If I’m given a bagel in the morning, I cut it in half and then into fourths. Then I cut it into eighths. I tear one piece up into bits and scatter it around my plate. I feel like I’ve consumed a bagel that way. But I would never do that with a croissant. It’s too fattening.”

Her favorite breakfast recipe is in the book: Green Juice, which she makes with her juicer. It is, indeed, very green because she uses home-grown vegetables. (In the winter, she grows produce in a “small greenhouse.”) She says the juice is rich in nutrients and fresh enzymes, gives her a jolt of energy and also keeps her hair shiny and strong.

“Today I have two garden editors and a photo editor here taking photos of daffodils we planted last fall,” she says. “We had green juice together. It’s not a specific recipe. It’s what I have on hand. Today it was made with the peel of a grapefruit, fresh spinach, fresh parsley, a little cilantro and cucumbers and ice. I also had one tiny scrambled egg.”

From your hens?

“Yes, from my hens,” she says. “And that was it. That’s how I started my day.”

She adds that she worked out with her trainer beforehand for an hour, as she does every day. The trainer had green juice also.

“It is really about living it,” she says. “It is important if you’re going to write it to live it.”

STEWART’S ’10 GOLDEN RULES’ FOR AGING

Martha Stewart compares aging to a bonsai tree, which is revered in Japan and, with proper care, flourishes as it ages. Her “10 Golden Rules” for growing old beautifully, like the bonsai:

• Eat well

• Maintain a healthy weight

• Stay physically active

• Get quality sleep

• Wear sunscreen

• Collaborate with a good primary care doctor regularly

• Find your passion

• Connect with others

• Stop complaining — change what you can, and accept what you cannot

• Stay curious

Copyright © 2013 USA TODAY, a division of Gannett Co. Inc.

Source: USA TODAY

Packers, movers, decorators — and counselors. That’s how Michele Parchman and Sandy Nauta describe the philosophy behind their business, Senior Focused Relocations in the Dallas-Fort Worth area.

Movers that specialize in seniors aim to smooth the way during one of the most trying times of life, when an elderly person either decides to move or is forced to move because they can no longer live alone or care for themselves.

As the ranks of the elderly soar in the USA, small businesses that cater to them, including movers, are thriving. The number of local companies registered with the National Association of Senior Move Managers has grown from 30 to more than 800 since 2002, says the group, based in Hinsdale, Ill.

Parchman and Nauta say the average age of their clients is 84. The size of their staff has grown to 15 full-time employees since they opened five years ago.

“Moving for a senior can be very stressful,” says Parchman. “We’re not just packing and moving them. We are taking care of our clients and their emotions. We calm their fears. They ask us things like ‘How am I going to get this accomplished?’ ‘What’s it going to look like where I’m going?’ ‘What’s going to happen to the things I leave behind?’ “

When downsizing is needed, senior movers will arrange estate sales, locate and deliver items to storage facilities or arrange donations to charities. Costs vary, according to Mary Kay Buysse, executive director of NASMM; the association requires owners to provide estimates to clients, but hourly rates range from $30 to $90 depending on where customers live. A map on the organization’s website lists members in the USA and Canada, with links to their websites and contact information.

One difficult-to-measure “family” benefit, she says, is the lessened stress on adult children (who are often getting on in years themselves, work full time or live too far away) and grandchildren.

“Everyone in the family wins from this,” Buysse says. “When a senior has lived in their home for 50 years, a move shouldn’t end up being done on one weekend with a dumpster in the driveway. Now a family can be supportive during the move instead of being the bad cop saying, ‘No, you can’t take that with you.’ ”

Katherine Cunningham, 91, of Fort Worth, says she didn’t want to burden her sons, both retired, when she made her first move in 50 years. She downsized last week into an apartment about a third the size of her 2,700-square-foot home.

“This was going to be a full-time job, and it would have taken them a long time,” Cunningham says. “I didn’t want to interfere with their lives.”

Plus, Cunningham says, Senior Focused Relocations didn’t leave until she was happy. She is “only 4-10,” she says, and the company made sure everything in her new apartment was arranged on shelves or hung at heights she could reach. “They thought of everything,” she says.

She had worried about “giving up so many fond memories” associated with her belongings, but the company drew a floor plan of her new apartment and helped her decide what she should take with her and where it would fit.

“That was really helpful,” she says. “I didn’t have to do anything but say, ‘Put it there and there’ when we got to my new home.”

For her, seeing a favorite painting hung on her new walls was a heartwarming moment.

“One of the most important things to remember when an older parent moves to a new living arrangement is to make sure they have things that are meaningful,” says Lynn Feinberg, AARP’s caregiving expert. “It’s not just important to have mementos but something that is meaningful for them.”

Some objects are so precious because of their ties to the past — clothes of a deceased spouse and other intimate items — that family members lean on a “third party” to remove them, says Lynette Reynolds, a co-owner of At Your Service in Orlando, Fla.

“We recently helped move a widower who had been in his house for 50 years,” Reynolds says. “His wife had been deceased for several years, and her fingernail polish was still on the nightside table on her side of the bed. It must have been comforting for him to leave it there. Something like that would be very hard for a family member to have to pick up and move.”

Reynolds was a “godsend,” says Dawn Schoettler of Binghamton, N.Y. When Schoettler’s mom, Rita Hopkins, who lives in Winter Park, Fla., shattered her ankle, Schoettler called At Your Service for help. A social worker assigned to Hopkins recommended the company, Schoettler says.

“They found a retirement community for her to live in, when I couldn’t be there,” says Schoettler. “I never even met Lynette, but she took care of everything from packing her up, unpacking her, putting food in the refrigerator for her and hanging up her shower curtain.”

The cost (about $700) was minuscule, says Schoettler, compared with what it would have cost her to take time off from work, travel to Florida several times and pay additional costs like renting a car. Also, because Reynolds knows the area, she could recommend several retirement communities.

“Everything just worked out so well,” says Schoettler. “She still checks in on Mom.”

Copyright © 2013 USA TODAY, a division of Gannett Co. Inc.

Source: USA TODAY

The most severe injuries in the Boston bombing resemble those suffered by troops in Iraq and Afghanistan whose limbs were blown apart by improvised explosive devices — and the initial treatment was also identical: First responders — and in some instances, spectators — used tourniquets to cut off the blood flow and stop severe bleeding.

More than 170 people were hurt Monday and three died when two explosive devices went off along mile 26 of the Boston Marathon on Boylston Street.

Hospital workers saw “many patients come in with tourniquets. Some had multiple tourniquets. They definitely saved patients’ lives,” says Michael Yaffe, a trauma physician at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston, where 24 patients were treated Monday.

“A lot has emerged from the Iraq and Afghan wars,” adds Yaffe, who is a lieutenant colonel in the Army Reserves. “A tourniquet is a standard piece of equipment for a soldier to carry now. They might wear one out on an assignment and not tighten it unless they have to.”

Tourniquets have been used on battlefields for hundreds of years; they’ve been carried by every U.S. service member in combat since 2006, with an estimated 3,000 lives saved.

To make a tourniquet, a strip or band of cloth is wrapped tightly around a bleeding arm or leg above the wound to compress the area and stem blood flow. Troops use a simple version with a Velcro strap that can be applied with one hand.

The Boston scene Monday was “numbingly reminiscent of some of the scenes we saw in Iraq and Afghanistan,” says retired Army colonel Brian Eastridge, a veteran of several combat deployments who directed trauma care in both war zones.

But tourniquets do pose a threat to the limb, and experts warn that they should be applied with caution.

While the thinking about when to apply a tourniquet is evolving, only trained people should use them or only as a last resort, according to Jeffrey Pellegrino, a member of the Scientific Advisory Council of the American Red Cross.

He says the limb below the tourniquet can be damaged when blood flow is cut off for too long and might have to be amputated. For that reason, tourniquets should also be marked with the time they were applied. After 30 minutes, he says the tourniquet should be slowly loosened, but not removed, to allow some blood to flow to the wounded tissue below the strap.

“The majority of bleeding incidents can be stopped by applying direct pressure to the wound,” Pellegrino says. “That’s always the first thing someone applying first aid should do.”

Most people who take first aid training from the American Red Cross will not learn about tourniquets because of the risk to the limb. It is taught by the American Red Cross in wilderness classes, however, for cases where someone can’t call 911 for help.

Bleeding from a trauma becomes “life threatening as the patient goes into shock. This typically occurs when more than 20% of a patient’s blood volume is lost,” says physician Jonas DeMuro, who works in the division of trauma and critical care at Winthrop-University Hospital, Mineola, N.Y.

But both in combat and in cases such as the Boston Marathon bombing, Yaffe says, the benefits of using a tourniquet can outweigh the risks.

Contributing: Gregg Zoroya

Copyright © 2013 USA TODAY, a division of Gannett Co. Inc.

Source: USA TODAY

The most severe injuries in the Boston bombing resemble those suffered by troops in Iraq and Afghanistan whose limbs were blown apart by improvised explosive devices — and the initial treatment was also identical: First responders — and in some instances, spectators — used tourniquets to cut off the blood flow and stop severe bleeding.

More than 170 people were hurt Monday and three died when two explosive devices went off along mile 26 of the Boston Marathon on Boylston Street.

Hospital workers saw “many patients come in with tourniquets. Some had multiple tourniquets. They definitely saved patients’ lives,” says Michael Yaffe, a trauma physician at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston, where 24 patients were treated Monday.

“A lot has emerged from the Iraq and Afghan wars,” adds Yaffe, who is a lieutenant colonel in the Army Reserves. “A tourniquet is a standard piece of equipment for a soldier to carry now. They might wear one out on an assignment and not tighten it unless they have to.”

Tourniquets have been used on battlefields for hundreds of years; they’ve been carried by every U.S. service member in combat since 2006, with an estimated 3,000 lives saved.

To make a tourniquet, a strip or band of cloth is wrapped tightly around a bleeding arm or leg above the wound to compress the area and stem blood flow. Troops use a simple version with a Velcro strap that can be applied with one hand.

The Boston scene Monday was “numbingly reminiscent of some of the scenes we saw in Iraq and Afghanistan,” says retired Army colonel Brian Eastridge, a veteran of several combat deployments who directed trauma care in both war zones.

But tourniquets do pose a threat to the limb, and experts warn that they should be applied with caution.

While the thinking about when to apply a tourniquet is evolving, only trained people should use them or only as a last resort, according to Jeffrey Pellegrino, a member of the Scientific Advisory Council of the American Red Cross.

He says the limb below the tourniquet can be damaged when blood flow is cut off for too long and might have to be amputated. For that reason, tourniquets should also be marked with the time they were applied. After 30 minutes, he says the tourniquet should be slowly loosened, but not removed, to allow some blood to flow to the wounded tissue below the strap.

“The majority of bleeding incidents can be stopped by applying direct pressure to the wound,” Pellegrino says. “That’s always the first thing someone applying first aid should do.”

Most people who take first aid training from the American Red Cross will not learn about tourniquets because of the risk to the limb. It is taught by the American Red Cross in wilderness classes, however, for cases where someone can’t call 911 for help.

Bleeding from a trauma becomes “life threatening as the patient goes into shock. This typically occurs when more than 20% of a patient’s blood volume is lost,” says physician Jonas DeMuro, who works in the division of trauma and critical care at Winthrop-University Hospital, Mineola, N.Y.

But both in combat and in cases such as the Boston Marathon bombing, Yaffe says, the benefits of using a tourniquet can outweigh the risks.

Contributing: Gregg Zoroya

Copyright © 2013 USA TODAY, a division of Gannett Co. Inc.