Knowledgeable Aging Podcast Knowledgeable Aging

For 20 years, I have been advocating for the vulnerable and dying.  For ten years, I trained and mediated elder disputes at the LA County Department of Consumer Affairs.  I helped elders with family issues, including financial abuse and end-of-life care.   In 2012, I earned an Executive Juris Doctor (EJD) from Concord Law School, a division of Purdue Global, majoring in Health Law.  My internship was in Pediatric Hospice, where I spent a year attending Interdisciplinary Team Meetings and writing about my experiences.

For many years, I have been a hospice volunteer sitting at the bedside of many dying patients.  In addition to supporting their families, I help tie up their final loose ends so they can pass in peace.  I have been a Thanatologist since 2015. I am certified as an expert in caring for the dying and bereaved and teaching others about the dying process.  I have clinical bioethics training and sat on two hospital bioethics committees.

In 2020, I became a Board-Certified Patient Advocate (BCPA) and started Ending Well Patient Advocacy, LLC.  I weaved my past experiences into a business that specializes in giving people a voice in planning the last chapter of their life.  I earned Facilitator certificates through Respecting Choices® and now offer community classes and presentations on advance care planning and surrogacy.

In January 2021, I became the Surrogate Consultant for the Final Exit Network (FEN).  My role is to help FEN members and their partners who act as surrogates or healthcare proxies enforce and honor the patient’s Advance Directives.

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Dan Morhaim, M.D. brings a unique perspective: Physician, state legislator, academic, author, consultant. As an emergency medicine physician, he’s been on the front lines of health care for over 40 years, including 13 years (1981-1994) as Chair of Emergency Medicine at Franklin Square Hospital (Maryland). After his election to the Maryland General Assembly in 1994, he joined the ER Team at Baltimore’s Sinai Hospital where he continues on staff. He was a physician volunteer for 3 years at a Baltimore homeless clinic and served on its Board, and he’s also worked on the Navajo Indian Reservation. As a state legislator, he served in the Maryland House of Delegates for 24 years (1995-2019), enacting 139 bills on a broad range of topics with a focus on healthcare, environment, public safety, and procurement reform. He has been and continues to be on numerous boards and committees including serving now as Chair of the Baltimore County Behavioral Health Advisory Council. He brings a clinical perspective to EagleForce, a health information technology company, and he is the medical director for commercial ambulance companies. As faculty at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health (16 years) he taught public policy, and his research on advance care planning led to numerous articles and two books: the first book in 2011 and his second in 2020 (“Preparing for A Better End, www.thebetterend.com) both from Johns Hopkins Press. The books have earned endorsements from a diverse group of distinguished people including Maya Angelou, U.S. Senator Ben Cardin, Dr. Leon McDougle, Dr. Leana Wen, and others from the medical, academic, faith, and business communities.

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As a National Board-Certified Teacher, Denise Calhoun developed a language arts curriculum for older adults titled, Changing Seasons: A Language Arts Curriculum for Healthy Aging, published by Purdue University Press. She has a BA and teaching credential from UCLA, a master’s degree from California State University, Northridge and an EdD and PhD from Pepperdine University where her research has been focused on communicative interaction and cognition in older adults. To provide global awareness on this topic, she has presented at organizations such as the American Association of University Women (AAUW) and California Assisted Living Association (CALA). She has also written several articles on the subject. Her most recent articles are Computer usage and cognitive capability of older adults: Analysis of data from HRS, published in Educational Gerontology and Rethinking the education potential of older adults to delay the onset of dementia, published in The Journal of Adult and Continuing Education. Dr. Calhoun is the CEO of Communicare-Connections, a company dedicated to helping older adults maintain quality of life. She is currently in the process of launching a nonprofit organization, Communicare, with her partner Dr. Seung Lee. Communicare strives to provide opportunities for lifelong learning and meaningful social interaction across generations using innovative technologies.

Seung B. Lee, PhD, is an Assistant Professor of Education at Pepperdine University in the Graduate School of Education and Psychology. His research focuses on collaborative learning, online interactions, socio-cognitive processes and creativity among K-12 students, particularly in the context of STEM education. He is currently involved in two studies funded by the National Science Foundation. Dr. Lee’s methodological expertise is in quantitative ethnography and epistemic network analysis (ENA), which apply statistical and visualization techniques to model the structure of connections in the data. He served as the Program Committee Co-chair for the 2020 International Conference on Quantitative Ethnography. His previous professional experiences include policy research and program management roles with the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), International Organization for Migration (IOM), and nonprofit foundations in Korea and the U.S.

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Lorraine Spiotta is a Community Liaison for Hospice of New Jersey. Building relationships within the community and simplifying the extensive coverage of hospice services to patients and families.

In addition, since 1997, Lorraine has worked to bring long term care insurance policies and a “peace of mind” to a diverse group of clients. Lorraine is the President and Founder of Senior Long-Term Care Insurance Brokerage, Inc.

Lorraine has been widely recognized and acknowledged in New Jersey as one of the foremost spokespersons in the LTCI (Long Term Care Insurance) industry. In addition, Lorraine is the author of “Key Solutions For Caregivers,” a simplistic and realistic guide for caregivers.

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Laurel Otey is the owner of Layered Living, a holistic wellness practice. She serves families and businesses worldwide as a certified Health Coach, international Wellness Educator, Celiac Disease Advocate, and Corporate Speaker. Laurel provides Health Coaching Programs with a focus on autoimmune disease, general Wellness Classes, and comprehensive Prenatal and Parenting Education for parents. All services are available online and by video-call.

Laurel transforms lives through the way we eat and live. Her clients eliminate unpleasant health symptoms and reduce their dependency on medications, resulting in decreased healthcare expenses. By alleviating unnecessary suffering, they gain a higher quality of life.

She was first inspired to begin her health coaching practice when faced with her child’s health problems. At one year old, Laurel’s oldest daughter began experiencing ongoing health problems – bloating and diarrhea, skin rashes, frequent illness, mood changes, and dark circles under her eyes. At the time, Laurel’s concerns were dismissed as those of a worried first-time mother.

Out of necessity and frustration, Laurel began researching in an effort to become a more informed and effective health advocate for her child. In the end, it was identified that her daughter did, in fact, have celiac disease and needed to be on a 100%, lifelong, gluten free diet (#nocrumbsplease).

This experience showed her that there is still a huge gap in knowledge and support around celiac disease and related conditions in our medical community. Laurel returned to school and graduated from the Institute for Integrative Nutrition. She now serves as a necessary bridge between patients and doctors.

In between coaching and classes, Laurel enjoys spending time with her three kind, intelligent, food-loving daughters and creating new, delicious, gluten free recipes with her husband. The wellness challenges they have faced and overcome together continue to inform and shape Laurel as both a mother and wellness professional.

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Kyrié (Kee-re-ay) is a corporate coach and ageism activist.  She loves being with others in their story, particularly at points of transition in career or life phase. She brings joy and enthusiasm to her coaching, focusing on gentle, sustainable growth as opposed to a “soul boot-camp.”

She is the co-founder of the anti-ageism clearinghouse OldSchool.info and the editor of the ChangingAging blog with more than 30,000 subscribers. She has spoken at the International Alzheimer’s Association Conference, the Eden Alternative Conference (featured in Atul Gawande’s best selling book: Being Mortal), and has most recently been touring the country with thought leader Dr. Bill Thomas on his ‘ChangingAging Tour’.  Kyrie’s book, Healing Dementia, has been endorsed by renowned geriatrician Al Power, and her work on OldSchool, with TED speaker Ashton Applewhite, was recently featured in the New York Times.

Kyrié splits her time between San Francisco and vagabonding in her Sprinter camper van. In 2015 she traveled to all 50 states via van the culmination of which was founding a wellness center, Prosper.

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