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Innov Aging
Innov Aging
innovateage
Innovation in Aging
2399-5300 Oxford University Press US 

10.1093/geroni/igaa057.2426
igaa057.2426
Abstracts
Session 6135 (Symposium)
AcademicSubjects/SOC02600
Effective Communications Techniques for Communities to Reach Older Adults in a Natural Disaster
Fletcher Patricia  
Federal Emergency Management Agency, Washington, District of Columbia, United States
2020 
16 12 2020 
16 12 2020 
4 Suppl 1 Program Abstracts from The GSA 2020 Annual Scientific Meeting “Turning 75: Why Age Matters”693 693
© The Author(s) 2020. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of The Gerontological Society of America.2020This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted reuse, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.Abstract
Framing timely messages during an emergency is often underestimated but is vitally essential and necessary, especially for the older population. While there is existing research on disaster and older adults, there is a gap in the literature that focuses on a 21st-century communication model that reaches at-risk populations. This presentation explores how practitioners can inspire change in the delivery of an emergency message to communities. Appropriately designed health communications will provide extensive knowledge about the health crisis and improve public health literacy among older adults in disaster preparedness, response, and recovery, creating messages that influence necessary behavior change during the emergency. Additionally, recognizing how collaborative partnerships with Federal, Local, State government, trusted relief agencies, and community groups benefit from designing an organizational structure to disseminate information to the community. Part of a symposium sponsored by Disasters and Older Adults Interest Group.