Senior Survey Will Help in Planning for Aging Services

Iona Senior Services is a respected non profit based in NW Washington DC, founded in 1975 with the mission of providing programs and education that support its "Age Well and Live Well" motto.

Iona Senior Services is currently seeking feedback from local residents to aid in planning for the next five years. This Northwest DC area has the largest concentration of residents over 60. As more people choose to retire in their homes, they are facing changes to their wellness needs. Iona Senior Services wants to be ready, willing and able to fulfill the requirements of the aging community.

If you are between the ages of 60 and 80 and live independently (not in assisted living), you are encouraged to help Iona assess its future plans to better be prepared to help you and your neighbors to live fulfilling and healthy lives.

The process is simple: through a brief phone interview (approximately 20 minutes), we will seek your advice on questions that range from: what are your current leisure activities to what kind of health, wellness, recreation and social services you would like Iona to develop.

The first step is to contact:

Lylie Fisher

Iona's Director of Community Engagement
Phone: 202.895.9425
Email: lfisher at iona dot org 

Thank you for your participation!

Still Life with Robin: No More Marketing Surveys!

by Peggy Robin

It’s been two days since I took my car in for its regular maintenance appointment. Sometime in the next few days I am certain to get a call from the marketing survey firm that does follow-ups on “customer satisfaction” for the car repair place. This happens every time I take the car in: A few days pass and then I get a phone call from a representative of an independent survey company who wants to read off five to ten minutes' worth of  generic questions about “my recent experience” with the service at the shop. In the past I have always agreed to this kind of interview. And then I have found myself stuck on the phone for what seems like an eon as the representative reads tonelessly from an inflexible script asking me to rate various components of that “experience” on a “one to five scale with one being the lowest and five being the highest.”

I have come to the realization that the questions are seldom if ever about anything important to me as a customer. The emphasis is always on how polite and friendly the staff members are, never about how efficient or competent they may be. There’s nothing about cost or value, either. There are numerous questions about how clean and comfortable the customer waiting lounge is. (Not applicable, as I prefer to drop the car off, or if I decide to wait for the car, I will take a walk to a nearby diner.) Then there is always that question about whether my service advisor offered to give me back any worn parts removed from the car. Yes, they always offer that, but so what? What on earth could I possibly get out of taking back my corroded old car parts? I wouldn’t recognize a defective thing-dingy from the engine of my car if it spoke to me in plain English and said, “Hey Peggy, I’m totally broken, so they had no choice but to replace me.”

Take a Health Survey, Men, and Maybe Win an Amazon Gift Card

Photo by Andrew Huff

Our male readers over age 18 are invited to take part in a University of Memphis health survey.  What's in it for you if you participate?  A chance to enter a drawing for a $50 Amazon gift card.  Want another reason?  Okay, try this one on for size:  Your answers can help researchers figure out why men engage in more high-risk behaviors than women and why they engage in fewer health-conscious behaviors than women.  Here's your official invitation:

In the United States, men experience  more serious health concerns than women, and health-related behaviors play a  large role in morbidity and mortality. In comparison to women, men engage in
more health-risk and fewer health-promoting behaviors. The existing research on health promotion models does not address why men engage in more health-risk and fewer health-promotion behaviors.