Age Friendly Healthcare initiatives in the Veterans Administration

Moderator: Daniel Forman, MD

While funding for Veterans Administration research has weathered some significant challenges over the last year, it still has successfully advanced Age Friendly healthcare initiatives that significantly enrich excellence in the care of older adults. Both clinical innovation and integrated research initiatives have progressed. In a one-hour session, the AGS research committee will present an overview of the remarkable Age Friendly VA initiatives, as well as the broader context opportunities in VA innovation and research. Speakers will address the value of the Age Friendly Health construct to provide care that is holistic and programmatic for older adults. The speakers will highlight the VA’s leadership in advancing clinical innovation and research, and the integrated research overviews are intended to spark ideas and insights among the audience. Learning Objectives: (1) clarify VA State of the art oriented to Age Friendly Healthcare; (2) describe the state of current VA research oriented to older adults, both in respect to overall stability, funding priorities, and funding process, both in respect to Age Friendly SOTA as well as other initiatives; and (3) foster opportunities to learn from other investigators about their own research journeys, highlighting successes and challenges that relate to the first 2 talks.  

Age Friendly Health Systems initiative State of the Art (SOTA) Research Meeting
Andrea Schwartz, MD

Overview of the State of Current VA Aging Research Initiatives
Holly Krull, PhD

Concrete Examples on How to Structure Applications to Maximize Their Programmatic Relevance via the Age-Friendly and Other Aging Research Initiatives
Clark Dumontier MD, MPH & Una Markis MD, MSc