A monthly newsletter brought to you by Sound Generations
Staying Connected: Top stories in this newsletter
EnhanceFitness and
Fall Prevention
September “Recommended Reads” List
Reframing Aging VLOG
Welcome New EnhanceWellness Orgs!
Fall Prevention Awareness to Action: How EnhanceFitness Reduces Fall Risk and Injury
Falls are multifactorial. This means that they involve and are dependent on a number of factors and causes. EnhanceFitness (EF) addresses biological factors by increasing mobility, balance and strength through consistent appropriate exercise. EF also addresses psychosocial factors including depression, loneliness and social support through consistent motivating social interactions with other class participants and a supportive instructor. The 2015 publication Participation in Older Adult Physical Activity Programs and Risk for Falls Requiring Medical Care, Washington State, 2005-2011 looked at participation in EF to determine association with a reduced risk of falls resulting medical care and found that both consistent and intermittent participation were associated with reduced risk. It concluded by stating that “evidence-based physical activity programs, particularly EF, should be more widely disseminated into communities not only for their general effects on fitness but also for their likely benefits on prevention of fall-related health care use, an important personal and societal outcome.”
NEW Project Enhance “Recommended Reads”: Our September List
Kakara R, Bergen G, Burns E, Stevens M. (2023). Nonfatal and Fatal Falls Among Adults Aged ≥65 Years — United States, 2020–2021. MMWR Morb Mortal Wkly Rep 2023;72:938–943. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.15585/mmwr.mm7235a1
Whitsel L, & Bantham A. (2023). It’s Time to Move: Integrating Physical Activity Assessment, Prescription, and Referral through Policy and Systems Change. Journal of Healthy Eating and Active Living, 3(1), 1–6. https://doi.org/10.51250/jheal.v3i1.65
Steinman L, Chadwick K, Chavez Santos E, Sravanam S, Johnson SS, Rensema E, Mayotte C, Denison P, Lorig K. (2023). Remote Evidence-Based Health Promotion Programs to Support U.S. Older Adults during COVID-19 and beyond: A Mixed Methods Outcome Evaluation. JMIR Preprints. 22/08/2023:52069
Denison P. (2023). Parks and Recreation Supports Aging in Place. Parks & Recreation: The Equity Issue, vol. 58, no. 9, September 2023, pp 24-25.
Send us your recommendations for our monthly list – let’s support each other to learn more, work better!
Healthy Living is Healthy Aging
In observance of September as Healthy Aging Month, Rear Admiral Paul Reed, Director of the U.S. Health and Human Services Office of Disease Prevention and Health Promotion (ODPHP), sat down with Patricia D’Antonio, Executive Director for the National Center to Reframe Aging, to discuss the myriad ways we encounter, and even perpetuate ageism in our everyday lives, and the importance of dispelling negative public perceptions of older adulthood and revisiting aging as not something that we “arrive at”, but rather a continuous process that we experience throughout our lifecycle. Give it a listen today!
Welcome to our newest EnhanceWellness Affiliates!
CALIFORNIA
Modoc County Public Health, Alturas, CA
City of Parlier, Parlier, CA
GEORGIA
Christian City Inc., Union City, GA
WASHINGTON
Ballard Northwest Senior Center, Seattle, WA
Be sure to attend our bi-monthly EW Coach Call on Friday, September 15th to connect! Need more info?
From the EnhanceFitness Instructor’s Facebook Group:
Recently we asked EF Instructor’s three questions in our “Getting To Know You” pop quiz! Want to play along? Log in and share your 1) number of years teaching group exercise, 2) title of a song in your current EF class playlist, 3) favorite cue!
Here is a sampling of what this amazing, skilled, supportive and FUN group of leaders shared:
Number of years teaching group exercise: 1- 44 years
Song title in current playlist: Walking on Sunshine, Calm Down, YMCA, Here Comes the Sun, September, Lady Marmalade, Freeway of Love, Car Wash, Splish Splash, Cupid Shuffle, Uptown Funk
Favorite Cue: “Crab Walk to the Right”, “We’re Speed Skating”, “Windshield Wipers”, “Hips Back”, “Pick Your Abs Up Off the Floor”, “Shoulder Back and Down”, “Squeeze 3-2-1”, “Stand Tall”, “Cross Country”, “You Do You”, “Don’t Hold Your Breath”, “Keep Breathing”, “Have Fun!”
Call to Action: 1) Join the group, 2) Add your answers and 3) Ask a new question
The Enhance Program Resource Portal
Expanded program resources are available to licensed EF and EW Affiliates and active EF instructors
“When I started, I could not sit to stand I had to use the arms of my chair to get up…This class has got me fit in my abilities to go buy groceries by myself and put them away. I can now walk three times a day and I exercise three times a week through the hybrid [EnhanceFitness] class. Everybody in the class encourages each other to continue if someone’s out. Someone follows up and there is no isolation for the members of this class…The weight loss is a bonus, but the mobility is a miracle. I can now do things that I thought I would never be able to do again. I can walk without looking at the ground. I can go upstairs step step step instead of foot step foot step foot step up the stairs. I can get up off the sofa without my hands and I can mop my whole house. Disability does not define me, thanks to EnhanceFitness.”
– EnhanceFitness Participant, New Mexico
All manuals can now be printed directly from the EF and EW Affiliate portals. Instructor candidates should have a hard copy of the manual prior to Day 1 of training.
To access the resource pages, please contact us at projectenhance@soundgenerations.org to request your account.
REMINDER! Pay invoices any time—day, night or weekends!
Project Enhance invoices can now be paid by credit card online through a secure web portal.
The link to the payment portal is included in the email sent with each invoice and on the invoice PDF itself. You can also find it on our website under Contact Us.
Offering livestream or hybrid program services? United States Affordable Connectivity Program has new outreach tools and translated resources to help clients determine if they qualify for low cost or free internet services and apply. Download the kit!
Let us help you build your capacity to reach more people and improve lives. Join upcoming EF Trainings and EW Trainings or contact projectenhance@soundgenerations.org to schedule yours today!