Aging Process For Elderly

Aging is one of the fascinating processes that human beings experience in their cycle of life. Despite being a biological process, some people believe that aging can be a process that is close to death where people get to transit from one lifetime to another. Many people get afraid of old age because it has its disadvantages, such as being vulnerable to chronic diseases and disabilities (NIA, n. d.). Scientifically, aging is the changes that the body gets through growing for a certain period of time, whereby it affects the physical and psychological process. Majorly, human beings start showing signs of aging on the surface of their skin at the age of 25 years. In the physical and biological process, different changes take place, such as the bones to grow weaker, and the muscles lose their elasticity, the bladder gets affected, and the blood vessels harden. Moreover, older people get exposed to medications that sometimes cause dehydration and in turn, affect the GI tract, thus experience a lot of constipation. The head carries one of the most vital organs. As a result, in the aging process, the hair on the head turns white, and the brain starts getting affected where the process of receiving information slows down. This can cause different issues such as memory loss and thinking process. This, in turn, affects the hearing process, vision whereby it starts to fade, thus needs the assistance of the spectacles to see better. Additionally, the teeth get affected because being exposed to bacterial infections. One of the organs that show more characteristics of aging is the skin where it starts to get dry, loses its elasticity, gets spots, and forms wrinkles. Due to the body being less active, the metabolism process slows down, causing weight gain (Mayo, 2018).

           On the other hand, aging comes with different disadvantages one of them being elderly abuse. The elderly adult that experiences Alzheimer's is mostly prone to a form of abuse. Abuse can happen in different ways whereby the elderly get neglected by their families, tortured emotionally and physically, and abandoned (WHO, 2018). Abuse can highly happen, especially when older adults are dependent on their families. As a result, in the health care system nurses and medical practitioners are supposed to be very careful about the aging process so that they can take care of the older adults. When doing an assessment, nurses are urged to focus on taking care of elderly patients, especially in the case of abnormalities. For instance, when an elderly person comes to the health care facilities, nurses are supposed to do assessments according to the physical symptoms. When an elderly person comes with dry skin, a nurse has to make sure that they have understood what the problem can be that is if it is dehydration or the damaged oil glands. On the other hand, the medication that elderly patients get subjected to is supposed to be reviewed for the purpose of their safety (Maher, Hanlon & Hajjar, 2013). Elderly people can be subjected to a lot of medication that can be a great risk to their system. Basically, the increase of the use of a lot of medication comes with the problem of that increases of damage to the organs, decreased functionality, depression, dementia, and vulnerability if bone breakage. As a result, the nurse has the responsibility of making sure that the elderly patients are taken care of well during an assessment. Regular assessment should be considered so that any risk that may threaten the life of the elderly patient is taken care of immediately (Green, 2018).

References

Green, S. Z. (2018)., Health Assessment of the Aging Adult. Health Assessment Foundations for Effective Practice. Retrieved from: https://lc.gcumedia.com/nrs434vn/health-assessment-foundations-for-effective-practice/v1.1/#/chapter/5

Maher, R. L., Hanlon, J., & Hajjar, E. R. (2013). Clinical consequences of polypharmacy in elderly. Expert opinion on drug safety, 13(1), 57-65. Retrieved from: https://ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3864987/

Mayo Clinic. (2018). Aging: What to Expect. Mayo Clinic. Retrieved from: https://www.mayoclinic.org/healthy-lifestyle/healthy-aging/in-depth/aging/art-20046070

NIA. (n. d.). Understanding the Dynamics of the Aging Process. National Institute on Aging. National Institute of Health. Retrieved from: https://www.nia.nih.gov/aging-well-21st-century-strategic-directions-research-aging/understanding-dynamics-aging

WHO. (2018)., Elder Abuse. Retrieved from: https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/elder-abuse