Chances are listeners know someone with dementia, struggle with it themselves, or are concerned they will experience memory and motor loss in the future. The Alzheimer’s Association is a go-to source for not just Alzheimer’s but also learning about all dementias. It is helpful to know there are differences in dementia and there are actions we can take to help ourselves diminish the chances of getting dementia and to be better prepared if dementia does find its way into our lives.
Brain Health in the workforce is the latest effort by the Alzheimer’s Association to empower people towards a healthy future. RoseMary Jaramillo, Alzheimer’s Association SE Colorado Director, shares current best practice ideas. Learn more at: Alzheimer’s Association Colorado Chapter
Aging with Altitude is recorded in the Pikes Peak region with a focus on topics of aging interest across the country. We talk about both the everyday and novel needs and approaches to age with altitude – whether you’re in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida or Leadville, Colorado. The Pikes Peak Area Agency on Aging is the producer.
BEACON Senior News is a proud sponsor/partner for this podcast. BEACON Senior News empowers Colorado seniors with inspiring local stories, timely coverage of senior issues, health and travel features, retirement and financial guidance, senior expos and local resources — all presented in a fun, engaging way that helps older adults lead happier, healthier lives. Catch all the news at: beaconseniornews.com/
Transcript
MARTS:
Chances are listeners know someone with dementia, or are possibly struggling themselves with dementia. Sadly, I’ve just experienced this myself with my mother passing away recently. And I am one of those caregivers that every day thought to myself, oh my gosh, do I have dementia? I’m forgetting this. I must have dementia just like my mom.
Well, the good news is in today’s episode with RoseMary Jaramillo from the Alzheimer’s Association, you’re going to find out why the Alzheimer’s Association is the go-to resource for people who are caring for someone with dementia and different types of dementias or they themselves are struggling with it.
Not only is the Alzheimer’s Association a great resource, but they also have two wonderful new programs that they’re launching, one around workforce supports, and another around just overall brain health. So tune in today, hear from RoseMary Jaramillo, and take a deep breath and know that there are some resources out there for those struggling with dementia.
VOICEOVER:
You’re listening to Studio 809 podcast. This is what community sounds like.
MARTS:
Today, I have a quick thank you for our critical sponsorship and support from the Beacon Senior News. The Beacon Senior News is the go-to source, both in print and online, for all kinds of current great news stories, as well as a source for events to get involved with in the Pikes Peak region, Pueblo and Fremont counties. Seek out your copy today at libraries, grocery stores, and more.
Welcome to Aging with Altitude, a podcast providing information, advice, and resources for seniors, families, and caregivers to help you live your best life, courtesy of the Pikes Peak Area Agency on Aging. We’re coming to you from the Studio 809 Community Podcast Studio at The Next Us, a professional cooperative environment for small businesses in downtown Colorado Springs. I’m your host, Melissa Marts, with the Pikes Peak Area Council of Governments’ Area Agency on Aging.
I have in the room with me today, RoseMary Jaramillo. She’s with the Alzheimer’s Association. She’s with one particular area of the Alzheimer’s Association that serves a particular part of Colorado, which we’ll talk about that shortly, but happy to have her here.
I think this is the first time I’ve interviewed RoseMary with the Alzheimer’s Association, so wanting to dig into a couple of different things, but really important to have her here. The Alzheimer’s Association, folks think my person doesn’t have Alzheimer’s or, oh, you know, this isn’t about Alzheimer’s. Well, Alzheimer’s is really about more than just Alzheimer’s.
And I have my own personal path that I took with my mom, where I really benefited on so many levels from the support and the resources that the Alzheimer’s Association provided to me, and I’m going to share a little bit about that at some point. But for others that have been out there, I can’t speak highly enough that this is a resource that people need to tap into.
But before we really get into that, RoseMary, tell us a little bit about yourself. You and I found ourselves working in the field of aging at about the same time, and we left other careers and moved into aging. And so, again, just tell our listeners a little bit about who you are and how you found yourself at the Alzheimer’s Association.
ROSEMARY JARAMILLO:
We do go back quite a while, both in the nonprofit field. I actually found myself here because I was working at a local hospice, and I saw this opportunity arise as the director for Southeast Colorado Alzheimer’s Association. And so, I thought, why not take a chance? And I did. So, I’m at six-and-a-half years that I’ve been here. I get to meet the best people. I get to interact with the best people. I love what I’m doing, the education piece and the support piece. And so, really focusing still on community while building relationships and partnerships.
MARTS:
Yeah. And so, you mentioned that you are the director for the Southeast Colorado area. So, paint a picture a little bit about the Alzheimer’s Association, like national, local, regional. What is the structure of the Alzheimer’s Association?
JARAMILLO:
So, we are basically governed by our national association. And so, our really core mission is research and looking at developing research and a cure hopefully one day for Alzheimer’s disease. Our focus is Alzheimer’s and all dementias.
And we do often hear from people that say, my person doesn’t have Alzheimer’s, they have a different dementia. Well, you’re welcome to any of our education classes, support groups, any of that. And we do have offices throughout the country.
And we have our Denver office that kind of oversees our state. And so, we have, I think there’s four people that do what I do, is a four or five? We kind of divide the state up into regions and focus on those regions and support them in their needs.
MARTS:
Yeah. And so, Southeast, what is the Southeast region? What are you covering?
JARAMILLO:
Yeah. Southeast, we cover Park and Teller County all the way out east, all the way down south to the La Junta area, and then back around to Trinidad, Huerfano, Pueblo. And so, Pueblo and Colorado Springs, of course, are our biggest markets.
MARTS:
Yeah, for sure. And you talked about the major part of the Alzheimer’s Association is really trying to do that research part. And so, that’s when people are helping to donate, that’s really helping a lot to foster and further research out there.
But you also do a lot of education. And I will say that for me personally, with my mom, who really, I started seeing her decline at about 73. And it was a real mystery of what was really going on.
And she passed away recently at 83. So, we went through a 10-year period of decline for my mom. And where I really learned what I was seeing with my mom was sitting in on an Alzheimer’s Association mini-conference that you guys put on for free.
I was able to sit in through that, and it was all virtual. So, I was able to learn. And through that, I was first introduced to all the different types of dementia, not just Alzheimer’s, but then all these different ways that brains start to decline and how people have figured out prefrontal and all the different ones that I can’t even say right now.
So, for people who are listening right now, again, I really can’t speak highly enough of the information that comes out of the Alzheimer’s Association and how easy it is to access it. So, thank you for that, and making that available.
Right now, you guys, you shared with me the other day at a meeting where I ran into you about the latest and greatest class that the Alzheimer’s Association is putting on around brain research or something.
Tell us a little bit about this class that you’re currently working through and doing right now.
JARAMILLO:
We’re really excited about our new brain health program. What the Alzheimer’s Association did is, we brought the POINTER Study to the U.S., and so the results of the U.S. POINTER Study were if you do all these things, then your brain will be healthy, right? And so, our focus really is that healthy brain.
And so, a lot of the work that we’re focusing right now is those early stages and how do we get people in the early stages, because we can slow down the trajectory of the disease by doing all those things under the brain health. We’re really excited because we’re also focusing on brain health at work, and so focusing on employers and how are you helping your employees with their brain health.
And not only their brain health, but a lot of our employees are caregivers. They’re having to work full-time and care for aging parents or a spouse who has the disease, and then a lot of times that ends up affecting their work or they end up having to quit and be a full-time caregiver. And so, looking at those early stages and what are we doing for our brain health, for the healthy brain, and so focusing on that as well.
But also focusing on early intervention because it’s so important that people get a proper diagnosis, that we know what’s causing brain change, and that we’re able to make changes, subtle changes, that can affect the trajectory, right?
And so, that’s important. And I think with the more we understand the disease, the more we understand the brain, the more we can help make those changes. We all know that brain change starts happening long before we notice it, and so what does that brain change look like?
MARTS:
Yeah, so continuing to do the good research to keep opening our eyes as people, to what we can be doing to hopefully take better care of ourselves. And so, the class, is it a one-time class? Does it go for a couple of weeks? This brain health class, what’s the structure of it?
JARAMILLO:
Yeah, so the brain health class is a one-time class. We offer all our classes free to the community, and it’s important that we have an understanding of the disease. So, that’s one of our main classes is understanding Alzheimer’s and dementia.
And we also have our 10 warning signs, and that’s important because we want to be able to go, okay, there’s something happening. What’s happening with our person? And not just push it aside, and that helps us recognize some things and recognize them early enough so we can make some changes, right?
MARTS:
And those classes are separate from this?
JARAMILLO:
They’re all separate. Our brain health is a completely separate class from them.
All our classes are free to the public. We also have them virtually. We have different ways of getting them out to the public.
It’s important that we have this education, and we offer it free so people could take advantage of it. Because our caregivers are pretty strapped, right? And so, for them to have to pay for a class or do any of that stuff is difficult.
And that kind of leads us to our Walk to End Alzheimer’s. That helps support our programs, our caregiver support groups, all our education classes, the research, all the stuff that we’re doing to support brain health.
We do also have other classes specifically for the caregiver on helping with those resources, early stage, middle stage, and all the stuff in between.
MARTS:
Right. Let’s go back to the walk for a second. I participated in the walk the last couple of years, and it was a life-changing opportunity as a caregiver to go through that walk. And so, what date is the walk?
JARAMILLO:
This year, it actually is a little bit later. It’s on September 26. It’s at Memorial Park. We walk around the lake, and it’s always a beautiful day. There’s lots of people. We probably have around 2,500 people out there.
We have probably over 60 different tables with resources for our community, which are huge because our caregivers need resources and just support. And it’s a great event. Lots of enthusiasm. We have our DJ. Keeps things moving. We have good music.
There’s just a lot of camaraderie and people enjoying themselves. We even see at 10 o’clock in the morning people dancing to the music and just having a good time and gathering those resources. It doesn’t cost anything to register for the walk, but we ask people to register and to remember that this is our fundraiser that we put on.
And so, that’s how we are able to sustain our education classes and our support groups and the research. And then October 3rd, we have our Pueblo walk.
MARTS:
Okay. Great. Thanks for mentioning that, too, for the region.
And are there any other walks in the state of Colorado or across the country that go around a body of water, that go around a lake? Or do we have something even more special here in the Pikes Peak region?
JARAMILLO:
Well, I think the Pikes Peak region is special. I think Memorial Park and Prospect Lake are really, it’s such a great place. It’s such a central place. Lots of parking. You get to see the mountains. You get the lake. You get the trees. It’s a great day. People are in the park playing. Kids are playing. People are out on the, what are those things called? They’re paddle boards.
People are doing that. They have kids, I think at that time, it’s football or some sports. So it’s really a really great day. And we always have beautiful weather at that time of year.
MARTS:
Yeah. And I think there’s something meditative about literally doing a walk around the lake. And it’s a mile.
And you’re walking this kind of miracle mile in some ways as a caregiver or as other people who are supporting folks that know people who are going through these challenging times. And so I really do feel, and feel strongly, about how great that walk is here in Colorado Springs around that lake. I think that it has a lot of meaning and purpose. And it just has a really unique feel. I’ve done other walks or runs with other nonprofit fundraising events. And this one just really feels very different.
I’ve done stuff up and down Monument Valley Trail, lovely, but it’s just there’s something meditative about going in the circle and having the water. Again, you mentioned having Pikes Peak off in the distance, you know, this majestic mountain that rises up too, there’s just a lot that goes on there. I also as a person who has volunteered to help plan that event with your mighty one staff person, you know, the whole entire committee of people who helps to put on that event is a volunteer based group, right?
I’m amazed at what you guys pull off and how much the Alzheimer’s Association really does rely on volunteers, which means that donations to the Alzheimer’s Association really does go to the good work to provide the classes for free to do the research. I mean, all of those things are really helpful and really good.
We didn’t talk a whole lot yet about the fact that there are support groups also through the Alzheimer’s Association, right? You have these education classes that people can participate in, but then also support groups. Talk a little bit about the support groups.
JARAMILLO:
And thank you for mentioning the volunteers and Teal and her team, they of course work in fund development, they put on the walks and they’re amazing. I have amazing volunteers that do our education classes, they facilitate those education classes. And we have amazing volunteers that facilitate those support groups. We have over a hundred throughout the state. We have several here in Colorado Springs alone. We actually have a volunteer, we just celebrated her 30th anniversary because she’s been volunteering with us for that long. They love what they do and they do it very well and it shows.
MARTS:
Yeah.
JARAMILLO:
Yeah. Yeah. And our support groups, we have them during the day, we have some on the weekend, we have some in the evening, we have virtual groups. And those are important, because a lot of times that’s the only kind of reprieve that our caregivers get is that hour-and-a-half support group, or sometimes they might take several support groups, but really that’s their only reprieve. That’s their only time away is to be able to decompress in an hour-and-a-half out of a month.
MARTS:
Yeah.
JARAMILLO:
Imagine.
MARTS:
And it’s also, again, I walked this walk with my mom and I never thought I would benefit from a support group. I don’t need a support group. I’m too busy. I’ve got this figured out. I work in the field. I have other professionals who are patting me on the back every day, telling me I’m doing a good job. I don’t need a support group.
But I’ll tell you what, going to a support group also really changed my way of being able to support my mom better, take care of myself better. It was so important.
And again, for people who are listening on this call, if you know someone who is caring for someone else, or if you’re a caregiver, really important to just keep planting that seed that these resources are out there, and that they are not alone. It might take a while for people to step up and realize that they might want to pick up the phone and make the call. But just being reminded is so helpful. And then once I got involved, what a difference it made.
And you mentioned that you have virtual. What do you find in terms of the balance between doing it in-person, whether it’s the class, whether it’s a support group, versus virtual?
Because really, COVID is kind of what brought on so many virtual opportunities for people. But what kinds of things have you heard over the last couple of years about in-person, virtual? What do you think?
JARAMILLO:
I think there’s just some people prefer virtual. Some people prefer in-person. Our caregivers are very isolated. So a lot of them do prefer the in-person groups.
MARTS:
I’m so glad to hear that, that they are coming.
JARAMILLO:
Yeah. Yeah. We have some very robust support groups, but they need that, right? They need that support. They need people to understand where they are, where they’ve been, where they’re going. They have information that other people might not have, right?
We might not even have the same information. And they also need somebody to say once in a while, you know what, you’re doing a good job. You’re doing a good job because it’s a hard job, right?
It’s a difficult job. And then you have the relationship with your person. So there’s that dynamic.
And then you have, how am I going to care for this person? And what’s my plan B? And what am I going to do if something happens to me?
And there’s so much, so many dynamics and so much loss, right? And it eases the burden a little bit going through it with other people.
MARTS:
Yeah. Yeah. That transition, that trajectory of life that you haven’t really thought about till you’re in it, right?
And how do people find out about the different classes and the support groups?
JARAMILLO:
We have a very robust website. It’s alz.org. And then I would put forward slash Colorado and then support groups or just type in Alzheimer’s support groups, Colorado Springs. It’ll take you right to it.
But the easiest way is to call our helpline and that helpline is staffed 24/7. And so that number of course, is 800-272-3900. And anybody, anywhere, anytime, can call that number and they can get that list. And that’s going to be the quickest way.
MARTS:
And I have heard testimonies from people who have called that support line, not realizing what they might even need. They just had finally hit rock bottom with their loved one and they just picked up the phone and were in a state of crisis. And that the person who answered that call just talked them through what was going on and listened to them and gave them supportive feedback back.
And so the person picked up the phone, not having any idea what to even ask for. They just called and said, I’m lost. I’m done. And the person on the other end of the call was able to just work them through where they were at, and then provided resources that of course people didn’t even know were out there for them. And so again, it’s nice to have that emergency call line that’s available for just calling and asking for what you need. And the Alzheimer’s Association can point you in the right direction.
So people need to take advantage of that as much as they can, for sure.
JARAMILLO:
Absolutely. Yeah, absolutely.
MARTS:
So we’ve talked about the fact that you have the brain health class that you have available through your website, through classes in the community. But I also want to mention that we have partnered, the area agency on aging and the Pikes Peak Library District to bring your brain health class to the Cheyenne Mountain Library here in El Paso County in Colorado Springs on June 23rd at 10:30 in the morning.
So June 23rd, 10:30 a.m., Cheyenne Mountain Library, we’re doing the class, which is great. We talked about the walk, which remind us of the date of the walks, September…
JARAMILLO:
26th.
MARTS:
September 26th, which is a Saturday. And I did want to mention that you guys have food trucks and coffee at the walk, which has been just really a great addition over the last couple of years to have those resources there too at the walk.
So with that all said, lots and lots of things happening with the Alzheimer’s Association from research to classes to support groups, a long history you’ve had, supporting people traveling around the state, making connections and resources available for people. Anything that we missed or anything else that we needed to get out here today?
JARAMILLO:
We’re always looking at connecting with different businesses that want to support that brain health also for their employees, which is important, right? And so we want to keep our employees healthy and keep them as long as we can. And I think that’s important.
And we have a very exciting program that we’re going to be launching on that. It’s our corporate brain health and that’s on June 18th. And we’re pretty excited about that.
MARTS:
Do you have a location for that launch?
JARAMILLO:
We do have that. And that one’s by special invitation. So if you want a special invitation, they can reach out to me directly. And so I hope you’ll be there. And they can reach me directly.
MARTS:
What’s your phone number, RoseMary?
JARMILLO:
My phone number is (719) 209-9384. I just went through a hundred different phone numbers in my head.
MARTS:
Yeah.
JARAMILLO:
Yeah. (719) 209-9384 if they want that invitation, but I’d love to have you there.
MARTS:
Okay, thanks. And we’ll look forward to that and spreading the word out to all the businesses to be thinking about it. Because really, I think there are some core companies in our region, and maybe throughout the country too, hopefully, at the Alzheimer’s Association is making this available nationwide companies who do want to be able to provide more resources to their staff and help them do what they’ve got to do. So glad to hear all that. Thank you for being here today.
JARAMILLO:
Thank you.
MARTS:
Welcome to a busy summer season and looking forward to the walk at the end of September.
JARAMILLO:
Thank you. Thank you for your support.
MARTS:
That’s the show. Thanks to all of you for being with us today. Aging with Altitude is created by the Pikes Peak Area Council of Governments’ Area Agency on Aging.
Visit us at ppacg.org and click on aging services for more information about the programs of the area agency on aging.