Having been the leader of an organization committed to the long-term care of

neurologically damaged adults, the study of gerontology offers me the opportunity to expand
my knowledge of the non-clinical care of this and other vulnerable populations of seniors. The
experience of working with a challenged population and achieving positive results in terms of
wellbeing and quality of life in the final phases encouraged me to attain the credentials to
support credibility in my writing with the attempts to influence long term care policy.
While much of health care research is a-paradigmatic, focused on pragmatism, mu
person philosophy is more of the notion of critical realism (Shannon-Baker, 2016) with process-
based causal inferences offering an emic/etic integration that allows for reality to exist outside
perception. This is consistent with the biological/physical science that has to be a part of aging
studies and healthcare research. I believe that adherence to the research question retaining the
flexibility of abductive logic and incorporating both-and logic into the research design
(Tashakkori, Johnsnon, & Teddlie, 2021) will produce high value research and guide my future
endeavors.

In terms of employment, I am the CEO of both the Neuro Vitality Center and the Neuro
Vitality Foundation. We are in the process of converting NVC to a PACE program that will be run
by the local NVP hospital, and I will spend full time working with the foundation to distribute
support for research and programs that benefit the elderly in the Coachella Valley. I intend to
publish both research and aging theory once my dissertation is accepted. Living old age lends a
unique and, I think, valuable perspective and these courses have provided a further dimension
that I hope to be able to share more widely.

References
Shannon-Baker, P. (2016). Making Paradigms Meaningful in Mixed Methods Research. Journal of
Mixed Methods Research, 10(4), 319-334. doi:10.1177/1558689815575861
Tashakkori, A., Johnsnon, R., & Teddlie, C. (2021). Mixed Methods Research, 2nd ed. Thousand
Oaks: Sage Publishing.