Last week on KSAT.

We brought you Aging in Place a next chapter, a forum.

It's part of our ongoing initiative focusing on the rewards and challenges of growing older.

That special program focused on how older Kentuckians are aging in place, meaning they're maintaining their independence in their own homes and communities.

Bowling green occupational therapist and her mother are helping lead the charge to help older adults age safely and happily at home.

Our Laura Rogers tells us more.

Being an occupational therapist, I worked with the geriatric population and just developed a passion for it.

That passion led Lisa Carney to begin a practice called Age in Place.

What do you do every day?

What do you love to do and how can I help you maintain that?

Carney conducts home safety assessments to see what changes could make the home safer and more accessible.

Watch them navigate around the environment.

I see what they need for safety.

We look at the entryway.

We look at the lighting.

Is there enough lighting?

Are there throw rugs?

Lisa came along, says to me, and made me take up the throw rugs in the bathroom.

Maryanne is Lisa's mother.

The key is to make a plan.

She's helping her mother and others like her make those plans to age safely and happily at home.

What tends to happen is people wait until there's a crisis.

A fall can happen in a moment, and all of a sudden you can't bear weight and you have to have a wheelchair.

And is your home ready?

There are also things you can do to help prevent those falls, a leading cause of death and injury for older adults.

Balance assessment by a physical therapist.

Getting your hearing checked.

Getting your vision checked.

We put grab bars up very quickly when we moved in.

And then I had knee surgery and we were really glad we had the grab bars.

Mary Ann says she and her husband considered their goal of aging in place when they bought this house in their 70s.

So our house has one step from the sidewalk to the front porch, and one step from the front porch in, and everything is on one floor.

She's also spearheading efforts for Bowling Green to join the Village to Village network.

There's about 300 villages in the United States right now, all of them different, but with the same goal of connecting seniors to the help they may need.

The Village movement is a movement to help people stay in their homes, and that means combating two main challenges.

Isolation and transportation.

Villages vet volunteers to help seniors with basic needs, a ride to their doctor's appointment or a light bulb change.

Changing a light bulb is now a challenge because we have high ceilings, we can't get up on the ladder anymore.

Marianne was also inspired by the society for Lifelong Learning at Western Kentucky University.

That gives intellectual stimulation, and frankly, that changed my life.

There's a lot going on, a lot of different people providing services and a lot of activities, but there's no one place to go to find out what's going on.

Our village is starting with what we're calling a resource hub.

Lisa Carney says the need for these resources continues to grow as life expectancy increases.

There's a huge need.

I feel like it's almost getting to a crisis point.

She says it's also important to know your insurance and what it covers.

Do you have traditional Medicare?

Do you have Medicare Advantage?

What does that cover?

Planning is the key.

Start started the marathon.

Thank you so much, Laura, for that.

And you can learn more about ways to remain independent in your golden years by watching our program aging and place a next chapter form that's available online and on demand at KETV.

Org.

And there you will also find other aging resources and information.

I hope you'll check it out.