CEO Blog

Minimizing the ever-present risk of inadvertently activating negative stereotypes about older people begins with us and is determined by how intentional we are in our word choice. As leading scholars in the field, GSA members are constantly publishing research that becomes immortalized in publications. Fortunately, an expanding number of journal style guides now feature entries on bias-free language to support authors during manuscript preparation.

Read more: Revised Style Guides Advance Age-Inclusive Language

The important work of the Friends of the National Institute on Aging (FoNIA) is continuing in 2022, and for the next two years, it will do so with GSA Vice President, Policy and Professional Affairs Patricia “Trish” D’Antonio serving as chair.

Congratulations to Trish for being named to this important post! Our society was a founding member of FoNIA, which now boasts more than 50 organizational members. It’s a broad coalition of organizations committed to the advancement of health sciences research that affects older Americans.

Read more: GSA Steps into Leadership Role with FoNIA Coalition

Congratulations to the editorial leadership of GSA’s journals for taking a very proactive step in advancing GSA’s commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI). They have published a new editorial, jointly appearing in the current issue of all of GSA’s journals, that offers guidance to all authors and reviewers moving forward — while also pledging to nurture the growth and recognition of scholars from groups that have been underrepresented in the journals.

Read more: GSA’s Journals Unite to Accelerate New DEI Guidance

The latest issue of Public Policy & Aging Report (PP&AR), “Addressing Systemic Inequities and Policy Deficiencies in the U.S.,” was overseen by the leadership of GSA’s Social Research, Policy, and Practice (SRPP) Section and is linked to the 2021 Annual Scientific Meeting (ASM) theme, “Disruption to Transformation: Aging in the ‘New Normal.’” SRPP Past Chair Bob Harootyan, MS, MA, FGSA, and current SRPP Chair Philip A Rozario, PhD, FGSA, served as contact editors and authored the issue’s opening article.

“The unprecedented disruptions precipitated by the global coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic and its disparate impacts, especially among communities of frail older adults and neighborhoods of color, are telling examples of persistent and insidious systemic forms of discrimination in society,” Harootyan and Rozario wrote. “During the same time, media coverage of police brutality and killings in the United States led to heightened demands for equity and justice for Black Americans and other marginalized populations. To that end, the 2021 ASM’s theme and the articles in this issue of PP&AR reflect our aspirations to learn from our past and reinvent a more equitable future.”

Read more: In Examining Systemic Inequities, PP&AR Asks Us to Learn from Societal Disruptions

We are on the cusp of a major expansion to the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the largest supporter of biomedical research in the world. Plans continue to move forward for the development of the Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health (ARPA-H), which would be housed at NIH.

This new agency — inspired by the achievements driven the by Department of Defense’s Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA)— is designed to “embrace bold and high-risk, high reward solutions with the potential to accelerate disruptive progress across an array of diseases and conditions and at levels ranging from the molecular to the societal.”

Read more: Potentially Game-Changing in the Research Arena, ARPA-H Draws Closer to Reality

The official dates of the GSA 2021 Annual Scientific Meeting Online are now in the rearview mirror, but I’m guessing even the most dedicated GSA member couldn’t have taken in all 1,200 individual symposium presentations, 700 papers, and 1,400 posters within a four-day span!

Fortunately, all of our scientific program remains accessible for registered attendees in on-demand format on the GSA 2021 meeting platform. All of this rich content — which embodied our meeting theme of “Disruption to Transformation: Aging in the ‘New Normal” — is available for consumption until December 31.

Read more: You Made a Difference: Your Science Lives on Through GSA’s Meeting Platform

Clostridioides difficile (or C. diff) is the most common health care associated infection. Yet only 30 percent of Americans have heard of this dangerous and potentially deadly disease. So in this November’s C. Diff Awareness month, let’s do what we can to raise awareness among colleagues, partners, and the public.

GSA has teamed-up with several other organizations to address the challenges presented by this bacterium. The Peggy Lillis Foundation has a website dedicated to helping friends, family, and healthcare workers “See C. diff.” It covers the risk factors, symptoms, and potential treatments, so we can protect ourselves and our loved ones from this preventable disease.

Read more: It’s Within Our Power to Curb C. diff

The Friends of the National Institute of Aging (FoNIA) coalition, of which GSA is a founding member, has designed a social media campaign to highlight the research that NIA funds and enhances the lives of all Americans.

FoNIA is encouraging all aging researchers to take a picture of themselves and/or something emblematic of their research and post to social media using #NIAFundsMe. FoNIA can then funnel these posts to appropriate Congressional social media feeds to expand awareness of your research and the key role NIA plays in advancing science.

Read more: Funded by NIA? Share Your Work Through a New Social Media Awareness Campaign

A new collaboration to build relationships between GSA and Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) is underway, and you’re invited to be a part of it.

As initiated by four alumni/faculty of HBCUs from within the GSA membership — Drs. Tamara Baker, Ashley Jennings, Tiffany Washington, and Felicia Wheaton — a kick-off meeting for all interested parties will take place online on Friday, October 22, from 1 to 2 pm. ET. If you are an alumni, faculty, staff, or student who represents an HBCU, or just want to learn more, please sign up and put this on your calendar.

Read more: GSA Invites Members to Participate in HBCU Collaboration

How have ongoing challenges to saving for retirement been exacerbated by COVID-19-related job losses? How does the legacy of race discrimination lead to negative economic and health impacts for older people of color? How could a proposed All Generations Plan for Social Security be a solution for preventing poverty in older people?

The answers to these questions can be found in the latest issue of Public Policy & Aging Report (PP&AR), “Retirement Structures and Processes.”

Read more: Pathways into Retirement Are Varied and Often Difficult, PP&AR Shows