TEACHING OLDER ADULTS BY ADAPTING FOR AGING CHANGES

Few teaching programs are geared to meet the special learning needs of the elderly. This pilot study used a quasi-experimental pretest-postt est design to measure the effect of the Adaptation for Aging Changes ( AAC) Method on fecal occult blood screening (FOBS) at meal sites for t he elderly in the South. The AAC Method uses techniques that adjust th e presentation to accommodate for normal aging changes and includes a demonstration of the procedure for collection of the stool blood test, memory reminders of the date to return the stool blood test, and writ ten materials adapted to the 5th grade reading level. In addition, act ual practice of the FOBS with the use of peanut butter was added to th e AAC Method, making it the AAC with Practice Method (AACP) in two sit es. The American Cancer Society's colorectal cancer educational slide- tape show served as the basis for all of the methods. Hemoccult II kit s were distributed at no cost to the participants. Descriptive statist ics, cho2, and logistic regressions were used to analyze data from 135 Council on Aging meal sites' participants. The average age of the par ticipants was 72 years; the average educational level was 8th grade; o ver half the sample was African-American; and half of the participants had incomes below the poverty level. Results support a significant in crease in participation in FOBS in participants taught by the AACP Met hod [chi2 (1, n = 56) = 5.34, p = 0.02; odds ratio = 6.2]. This resear ch provides support for teaching that makes adaptations for aging chan ges, especially adaptations that include actual practice of the proced ure.