Copperas Cove Senior Center hosts Expo

By PAMELA GRANT
Cove Leader-Press

Texas A&M AgriLife Extension hosted their first Senior Expo at the Copperas Cove Senior Center from 10 a.m. until 2 p.m. on Tuesday.

The Senior Expo focused on providing local seniors with information and resources to help them out. Community resources included AdventHealth which also provided health screenings, Meals on Wheels, “RU OK” program by the Copperas Cove Police Department, Integrity Rehab, Mature Drivers Program, and more. They also had several guest speakers including Gene Silverblatt who talked about estate planning, probate, and trust, Dr. Aval Green who talked about Alzheimer’s and dementia, Our Hospice House who presented an overview of their programs and services, and Chad Moss and Shelby Boismeir with Sneed - Carnley Funeral Chapel and Cremations who talked about funeral preparations.

“It gives them information, it gives them resources for things they may need, and it gets them out of the home which gives them the ability to socialize,” said Elizabeth Green, Director of RSVP with the Senior Center. “We had a good turn out today.”

“We selected resources and area speakers that we thought our seniors would benefit from,” said Donna Schwausch, County Extension Agent with Texas A&M AgriLife Extension. “We are excited to help the seniors that showed up.”

Schwausch attended the event with several members of the Community Health Advisory Board and many other volunteers.

Schwausch said that the Senior Expo was a great way for them to inform seniors about the programs and resources available to them. She said that sometimes people just don’t know what kind of programs are available and might think that they don’t qualify for resources that are, in fact, available to them.

“I didn’t know that Copperas Cove had an ‘RU Ok?’ program,” piped in Barbara Herring who helped with the event. “A lot of seniors do it by themselves, and that can be a scary thing. It’s a good resource for them—for someone to check on them.”

Volunteers with Texas A&M AgriLife Extension’s Silver Drivers Safe Texans allowed participants to try out different glasses to demonstrate impaired driving, such as driving under the influence, or driving with glaucoma or cataracts. They could wear glasses simulating being under the influence of marijuana which made it so they could not see blinking lights or distinguish easily between different colors.

Several of the event participants took the opportunity to listen and talk with the various guest speakers.

“I thought the group was very interactive,” said Dr. Aval Green, a doctor with Baylor Scott & White Health who taught a class on Alzheimer’s and dementia. “It’s something that touches all of our lives at one point or another…I feel like it’s important to talk to people face to face…especially about something as important as geriatrics.”