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Aging In Community

Because many of today’s older adults want to remain in their homes and neighborhoods as they age, Archstone Foundation made aging in community a funding priority.

Over the past few years, Archstone Foundation was more intentional within its Aging in Community priority area. This intentionality can be seen in funded projects that: 1) address systems and/or policy change; 2) focus on building the field; 3) include demonstrated, measurable health outcomes; 4) bridge the gap between health care and social needs care; and/or 5) are inclusive of broad partnerships working collectively to impact issues much greater than any of us can take on alone. A few of these intentional projects that improve the well-being of older people in their homes and communities are highlighted below.

ReFraming Aging – Sustaining the ReFraming Aging Initiative

The Gerontological Society of America (GSA) received a three-year grant in March 2019, to carry on and expand the work that initially began by Grantmakers In Aging to “reframe” the public discourse about older adults, who they are, what issues affect them, how they contribute to society, and how society can best integrate their needs and contributions. This work began as a two-phase research initiative to: 1) bring together and unify the strength and voice of prominent leaders in the field of aging; 2) glean information on and clarify, via expert research, the public’s and media’s current beliefs about older adults; and 3) lay the foundation for a systematic approach to more effectively engage the public, media, and policymakers by developing and testing new metaphors designed to move the public’s perceptions of older adults to more accurate perceptions. To continue this work, GSA will engage the practice, education, and research communities in the aging field to increase awareness of the ReFraming Aging principles and their ability to utilize the ReFraming Aging tools. GSA will provide technical support for individuals representing organizations who successfully complete the ReFraming Aging training, and they will support state and local organizations’ efforts to adopt the ReFraming Aging principles.

Impact of SNAP on Health Outcomes in a High-Risk Older Adult Population: A Policy Evaluation to Drive Advocacy Efforts

In March 2019, the University of California San Francisco, on behalf of the UCSF Center for Vulnerable Populations at San Francisco General Hospital, received a two-year grant to examine the impact of CalFresh (SNAP) benefits on health outcomes among low-income older adults who receive Supplemental Security Income (SSI) benefits. For decades, California was the only state in the nation to uphold a policy in which individuals receiving SSI were not eligible to receive CalFresh. The policy maintained that CalFresh benefits were already included as part of an individual’s SSI check. Over time however, the real value of the SSI benefit has declined, while ineligibility for CalFresh was retained. In summer 2019, for the first time, the State of California will end this policy excluding SSI recipients from CalFresh benefits, thus extending benefits to a new, large, and high-risk population. This project seeks to: 1) determine the extent to which SNAP reduces healthcare utilization and expenditures and improves health outcomes among low-income older adults who receive SSI benefits, and 2) support efforts to expand or implement policies, systems, and programs that support older adult SNAP enrollment.

Medi-Cal Medically Tailored Meals Pilot Program

Project Open Hand (POH) was awarded a three-year grant in March 2018, for the launch of the first-in-the-nation, Medi-Cal Medically Tailored Meals (MTM) Pilot Program to address the nutritional needs of California’s most vulnerable, critically ill, and high-health care utilizers. The MTM Pilot Program, overseen by the California Department of Health Care Services, is a public – private partnership, with funding through Senate Bill 97 (SB-97). SB-97 approved $6 million over three years to provide medically tailored food and nutrition therapy to 1,000 individuals statewide with severe or chronic illness. The MTM Pilot Project will be implemented by the California Food is Medicine Coalition (CAFIMC), an advocacy and policy coalition of six statewide agencies across eight counties, charged with developing and implementing standards of care around complete nutrition interventions to address food insecure, and critically ill individuals. Archstone Foundation is funding administrative oversight, and convening costs for CAFIMC, along with other key sectors and leaders, to come together to discuss successes and challenges of the pilot, to work in partnership to problem solve, and to address social determinants of health challenges among the low-income, ethnically diverse, and older pilot participants.

California Food Policy Advocates

California Food Policy Advocates (CFPA) was awarded a three-year grant to reduce hunger among older people in 2018. This project is designed to be a coordinated collection of complementary strategies and approaches that contribute to the increased enrollment of older people in CalFresh through systems and policy change and broad partnerships working together. CFPA seeks to enroll up to 50,000 low-income older adults into food assistance through CalFresh.

Integrating Social Needs into the Delivery of Health Care to Improve the Nation’s Health

In March 2018, the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (National Academies) received a two-year grant to support a consensus study that will convene an ad hoc committee to examine the potential for integrating services addressing social needs and the social determinants of health into the delivery of health care to achieve better health outcomes and to address major challenges facing the U.S. health care system. The committee will make recommendations on how to: 1) expand social needs care services; 2) better coordinate roles for social needs care providers in interprofessional care teams across the continuum of clinical and community health settings; and 3) optimize the effectiveness of social services to improve health and health care. The report was released in October 2019 and more information can be found here.

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