Welcome to Aging Edge, the new section of post-gazette.com intended to give older adults, their families and the professionals who deal with them a one-stop guide to both new information and permanent resources. It’s a little bit like a blog, but also much more than that, providing a comprehensive news tool focused on local aging unlike anything else we’ve seen on the Internet. You may have seen our trial run last week, a period we used to iron out a few glitches and kinks (we think).
Aging Edge will package the latest articles that have appeared in the Post-Gazette on aging-related topics, plus highlight worthwhile work done in other publications and inform readers about new research findings and upcoming events. We’ll archive prior articles in a way that makes it easy to find them long after they appeared, by clicking on either the headlines you see on the section front or the tabs above that package stories related to Health, Housing, Caregiving, Work and Finances.
Clicking on any of the Where to Start, Where to Go sections at the bottom of Aging Edge’s main page will lead to background information on topics daunting to many families, such as navigating the long-term care system and dealing with dementia and end-of-life planning. Included at the end of each topic are web links and phone numbers for consumers to access government help, private resources or additional practical information.
On the lower right of the section front, under Expert Q&A, you’ll find frequent interviews with both local and national experts on aging-related topics that are fresh in the news or have permanent relevance. The first is with longtime Allegheny County Area Agency on Aging Administrator Mildred Morrison, describing programs and trends.
And this guide that you’re presently reading, ”Gary Rotstein’s What’s New in Aging ...” (please excuse the narcissism, but it lets you know you’re reading a bloggish post instead of an actual article) will be regularly updated. Check it frequently to be advised what’s new on the Aging Edge site, to be linked to worthwhile articles published elsewhere, to learn of upcoming programs or events in our region or discover something else that might be useful. For starters, for those truly interested in aging trends locally, there’s no better resource than the vast amount of subjects covered in “The State of Aging in Allegheny County,” a comprehensive report from the University of Pittsburgh’s University Center for Social & Urban Research.
Why are we introducing Aging Edge, other than to help fill up the time of your curator, who finds himself rapidly aging? (What? I’m 57? How’d that happen?)
Here’s why: The Post-Gazette publishes a vast amount of information of interest to older adults and those who care about them, and that content can remain useful long after it has been published if we make it easy to find. In addition, we have access to all kinds of valuable content from other sources that can be provided here in a manner that is not possible in a daily newspaper.
It’s an innovative web venture that few other media in the country have attempted, but we deem it all the more important in Pittsburgh, a region long known for its high proportion of elderly. (Census data show 18.3 percent of the metropolitan area’s population to be 65 or older, compared to 14.5 percent nationwide.)
We hope you’ll find it worthwhile to return to Aging Edge frequently, and we hope you’ll offer ideas to make it still more relevant for you in the future. Please send those suggestions and any other feedback you like, including questions about the site and our coverage of aging, to grotstein@post-gazette.com.
Gary Rotstein: grotstein@post-gazette.com or 412-263-1255.
First Published: April 11, 2016, 4:00 a.m.
