Dear baby boomers,
Thank you, thank you, thank you! You made my ugly-as-sin, chunky, deep-cut, orthopedic “sneakers” acceptable to wear with my fancy tailored business suit. I don’t have to pull a Mr. Rogers and change into my beautiful Italian dress shoes while choking down a grimace due to the foot pain.
Because of you, boomers, I can unapologetically rock these bad-boy size 12 shoes (but aren’t they really a 13 with all the cushion?) as I stand up from the speaker’s table. I thank you; my hammer toes thank you; and the global orthopedic footwear market currently valued at $8.3 billion thanks you too!
While my podiatrist was fitting me for my newest set of orthotics that would gracefully slide into my orthopedic sneakers, I asked, “Will I ever be able to wear a dress shoe again?” He assured me that I could get a second pair of slimmer orthotics designed for my dress shoes but added that “no one is really doing that anymore.” Thank you, boomers (and, yes, as my editor informs me, “baby boomers” is not capitalized for some mysterious journalism style reason). Fashion designers have heeded your economic muscle flexing and are bringing roomier shoes with additional padding, suitable for orthotic add-ins, to the market.
Dear boomers, it’s pretty clear that just like the shoe industry, you are revolutionizing the nursing home industry. Born between 1946 and 1964, you are known for your independence, confidence and hard-working goal-focused advocacy. Unlike your parents and their parents, you protested war, marched to combat injustices, and continue to fight for civil rights. You do not back down from authority. You brought about political and social change and are known to be an economically influential generation.
I’ve noticed that some nursing home experts refer to you as the “silver tsunami.” Does that offend you? What do you think of “silver wave”? They see you as solving all the industry’s occupancy issues. But I think they are missing an important point: You don’t want to be in a nursing home and are actively working to create alternatives. You are kicking our collective butts by forcing major nursing home reform. The nursing home industry (and some recoil at the label “industry,” to further prove a point) will look completely different than today, and long before you “solve our occupancy issues.”
The Center for Medicare Advocacy and The National Consumer Voice are examples of two very different organizations tirelessly working to change the way our nation’s elders receive care. Go to their websites, peel back a few layers — there, we see you! Baby boomers’ work on nursing home reform issues that not-so-coincidentally mirrors President Biden’s nursing home reform agenda, as announced in his State of the Union address on March 1. Boomers, you get the job done!
Now, boomers, don’t be offended by this, but sometimes you and your nursing home advocates feel like adversaries to those tirelessly working within the industry. Do you feel the same way about us? You seem to want more than we can offer and blame us for things that seem out of our control. But to be honest, I have asked nursing home clinicians, operators and owners if they would want to reside in a nursing home, even their nursing home. The answer is overwhelmingly NO. Bottom line: We believe that we are providing good care within the current limitations of our healthcare environment, but we can do better.
Dear Boomers, do for our industry what you did for the shoe industry. Make aging cool. Help our society place more value on the people who care for the aging. Let’s collaborate on reforming our industry to provide spaces we all would delight in living in. You will ultimately make it better for the next generation of elders who need institutional care, and their caregivers. Why am I so sure? Look at our world today — or just look at my shoes!
Steven Littlehale is a gerontological clinical nurse specialist and chief innovation officer at Zimmet Healthcare Services Group.
The opinions expressed in McKnight’s Long-Term Care News guest submissions are the author’s and are not necessarily those of McKnight’s Long-Term Care News or its editors.
