WINONA, Minn. (AP) - Each Wednesday, volunteer Katy Hammond shows up at 77-year-old Alice Topness’s Winona apartment, dressed in workout clothes and carrying an iPad. She sets the iPad in front of Topness’s worn green armchair, types a few passwords, and soon a tinny ’Hi, Alice. How are you?’ comes from the iPad.
On the screen, Topness can see instructor Alison Ogren and class participants getting set up for Movin’ to the Oldies, a moderate exercise class at the Winona Senior Friendship Center that involves chair exercises, body movements, and resistance bands to tunes like “Tutti Frutti” and “Stand By Me.”
Together with Hammond, Topness participates in the class from her dark green armchair, as part of a new program offered at the Winona Senior Friendship Center called Friendships Forever.
It’s a program designed for folks like Topness, who doesn’t drive and prefers not to walk very far in the winter, since her back bothers her and she’s worried about slipping. For her, getting to the center for exercise classes and other events is just too big of a hurdle.
Center director Malia Fox said she’s seen too many older adults stop coming to the center for various reasons - from medical issues to the perils of winter driving. Friendships Forever aims to eliminate those barriers to participation at the center.
The program received a grant from the Blandin Foundation last summer to purchase five iPads with wireless connections. Then in September 2014, Fox recruited a group of WSU students who were interested in working with older adults, and the program was born. Currently 10 seniors participate in the program regularly, with another four coming in every now and then.
Topness, who started participating in the program a few months ago, enjoys both the exercise and Hammond’s company. She is a painter and is used to working alone with just her cat, Max, for company, but she feels lonesome at times.
“I enjoy people around, if they don’t mind coming up here with all this stuff,” Topness explained, gesturing around her living room, crowded with paints, brushes, and finished paintings.
Fox said the social component of the program has been just as important as its active component, since social isolation has been linked to poor health, particularly in older adults. Unlike an exercise video, the program is in real time, and brings interaction to seniors who might not otherwise see anybody else that day.
For Hammond, her time with Topness every week is part of an independent study course for her therapeutic recreation major at Winona State University. She said she has an internship at a senior living home this summer, so working with Topness fits right into her future goals.
“It’s just getting more exposure,” she told the Winona Daily News (https://bit.ly/1I8tfs4 ).
They exercised together on a recent Wednesday to Ogren’s instructions on the iPad, Topness’s chair creaking as she reached down to touch her toes.
“There you go, Alice,” Ogren said through the iPad.
“She saw me!” Topness said with grin, adding that it was strange that such a tiny camera could capture her. A lot of technology has changed in her lifetime, she mused. “I wonder what’ll be next.”
Fox said the connection with Topness and others is just the beginning of what the program can do. As more of the population ages, the friendship center’s four walls might not be able to contain everybody who wants to attend programs, and Friendships Forever allows for growth in other community spaces.
Fox said she is already getting requests to bring the iPads to assisted living homes around Winona so groups there can participate in classes or teleconferences. She’s looking for other funding sources so the program can grow.
“There’s so much more to do,” she said.
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Information from: Winona Daily News, https://www.winonadailynews.com
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