Hot Springs native and 2011 graduate of Lakeside High School, Caroline Nester Rooney, will return to Hot Springs next week to host a series of events to discuss brain health education for older Arkansans.
Nester Rooney, a clinical neuropsychologist at Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island, will host the following free events:
Wednesday, around noon, at the Hot Springs Senior Center grand opening.
Thursday, 11:30 a.m., at the Garland County Library.
Thursday, 2 p.m., at Lake Forest Senior Living at Hot Springs Village.
Sunday, May 25, noon, at Grand Avenue United Methodist Church.
She will also pay a visit to her alma mater on Tuesday to speak with Lakeside students about her career.
“Join Dr. Caroline Nester Rooney for an informational conversation about brain health, led by a clinical neuropsychologist and aging/dementia specialist,” a news release said.
“Ever wonder: ‘How does my brain change as I get older?’ ‘Is there anything I can do to make my brain healthier?’ ‘Can I reduce my personal risk of getting dementia?’ This one-hour discussion will provide information about normal brain aging and dementia, and introduce practical behaviors that anyone can try to reduce their personal risk for dementia,” it said.
Nester Rooney said the presentations are open to the public and will offer basic education about brain aging, dementia and practical ways to support one’s brain health. She said a lot of confusion surrounds Alzheimer’s disease and dementia, and she hopes to clear up common misconceptions.
Part of Nester Rooney’s clinical work centers on supporting and expanding access to brain health care for those over age 65. She recently partnered with University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences doctors to conduct research using cutting-edge digital tools and telemedicine techniques to increase access to dementia diagnosis in more rural parts of the state.
While studying psychology at Hendrix College before moving on to Brown, she worked with neuropsychologists at UAMS and immediately “fell in love” with neuropsychology, she said. Nearly half of all cases of dementia, she said, are preventable through lifestyle and behavior changes, or things that anyone can do.
“I don’t think people realize how much control they can have over the health of their brain,” she told The Sentinel-Record last month. “So I want to call people’s attention to that and really provide practical science-backed tools they can do that anyone can try to really increase the health of their brains.”
She said the information is not only important for older adults but those of any age.
“People in their middle age, like 30s, 40s and 50s, our health that we have in those years can actually be really impactful on our risks for dementia. So we can make healthy changes at any time in our lives, but younger people as well can start to think about these types of things,” she said.
Nester Rooney is partnering with Lee Isaac, a geriatric-focused clinical neuropsychologist at UAMS, to help increase accessibility to brain health education for the diagnosis of cognitive changes. She said Isaac is the only aging-focused neuropsychologist in Arkansas, and access to his type of services is really low.
“We’re partnering together to see if we can use more novel tools like telehealth services and even like digital cognitive assessments, seeing how we can deploy these in populations that might be more rural, might be further away from being able to get these types of services, and seeing if we can make a difference in people’s brain health in that way,” she said.