Protect Yourself from Health and Fitness Misinformation and Fraud
By Andrew Walker, MPH; NSGA Director of Health & Well-Being
Health fraud, false fitness claims and scams cost older adults billions in financial losses and unnecessary distress.
A scam recently affected a member of the National Senior Games Association, the National Veterans Golden Age Games, whose event is free. A consumer alert from the Federal Trade Commission found that Veterans are reporting websites or social media pages that charge a fee to register. These sites were found to be fakes.
How to Spot Health Misinformation
Knowing what questions to ask is an essential consumer health skill. The National Institute on Aging (NIA) suggests using the following questions to assess online information.
- What is the purpose of the website, and who owns or sponsors it? Knowing this background helps you understand whether the website’s motive is to provide unbiased content or to generate more sales.
- Who wrote the information? Who reviewed it? This is important because the site’s content should be provided by one or more experts in the field and not based on testimonials.
- When was the information written and updated? Science changes over time, and it’s essential to have the most recent evidence.
- Does the website offer quick and easy solutions to your health problems? Does it promise miracle cures? Confirm unique cures with licensed health providers.
The above questions can also apply to social media. Asking the right questions is important when it comes to social media fitness trends. It acts as a check on influencers, keeping them accountable, especially when they reap financial benefits.
According to the NIA, no government agency approves ads before they go public. They note that Federal law requires sellers that market cures to have scientific evidence to back up their claims, but dishonest companies might not. Ads must be truthful — not misleading.
For reliable sources of information about diseases and their treatments, the FTC recommends that you visit:
- MedlinePlus.gov, a site operated by the National Institutes of Health (NIH)
- NIH’s National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health, which has information about alternative and complementary medicine
- Healthfinder.gov, a trusted Health and Human Services site
We can’t prevent all fraud, scams, schemes and losses; however, strong consumer health skills increase the odds in your favor. The FTC encourages you to share your wisdom about avoiding swindles and fraud with the older adults in your life.
Pass It On: Fraud Education Campaign for Older Adults
You can take action to help others by being part of Pass It On, the FTC’s fraud education campaign for older adults. It has clear, direct advice about more than a dozen fraud topics.
At ftc.gov/PassItOn, you can:
- Read articles
- Download resources, like activity sheets and bookmarks
- Watch videos about frauds that target older adults
Too Good to be True!
Avoiding exploitation comes from applying common sense and accumulated wisdom. It reminds me of a time-tested adage that holds true today: if it sounds too good to be true, it’s probably not true!
Applying this adage and practicing consumer health skills will reduce your chances of being a victim of health schemes and misinformation.
- Published in Health & Well-Being
Women of the Senior Games: Strong at Every Age
Breaking barriers is second nature for women who compete in Senior Games.
Many of them grew up before Title IX, with little to no opportunities to participate in sports as youth. Today, as older adults, they’re defying the narrative that they’re “too old” to compete in sports.
You’ll find them tearing up the community track, logging laps at the neighborhood pool and challenging themselves with new sports. They’re putting in the work to achieve their personal best.
Photo by: Dave Fujii
In honor of National Girls & Women in Sports Day, we celebrate the incredible female athletes who participate in Senior Games.
They’re strong. They’re resilient. They’re committed.
They create a welcoming community for other women. They inspire us.
To these athletes: Thank you for showing the next generation of girls and women that sport belongs to them — at every age.
- Published in Senior Games Blogs
This Pitcher is Throwing Strikes and Plot Twists
February 2026 Athlete of the Month
By Del Moon, NSGA Storyteller
Brenda “B.J.” Jones, 65
Clarksville, Tennessee
Softball
Image courtesy Brenda Jones.
Maintaining an active lifestyle is essential, but it’s just one aspect of robust aging. Finding social connections and keeping your brain engaged are also key to longevity.
Senior softball pitching ace Brenda Jones has known this intuitively for her entire life and is excited to now have time to explore her creative side as an author.
“I’ve been playing softball ever since I was like six years old, and I finally published my first book at the age of 58,” the Tennessee native shares. “It’s never too late to try something new that’s going to improve you.”
A Lifelong Love of Sports
Brenda, known by most as B.J., is proud to be a late-blooming author, but it’s clear her entire life has revolved around sports. She grew up in a blended family with 13 siblings in Union City, a small west Tennessee town with one high school. All she cared about was reading books and if there were enough kids around to play basketball and softball.
By the time she became a teenager, B.J. was playing on a mostly adult community softball team that went on the road in the summers. “We’d get in our cars and go to different places – Jackson, Tennessee, Cairo, Illinois, Dyersburg, Tennessee – just wherever we could find teams to play,” she recalls.
Image courtesy Brenda Jones.
There was always time to play ball, even throughout her 26-year career as a banking compliance officer and busy mother. She also found her wedding diamond on a diamond, so to speak.
“I went to watch some neighborhood guys play baseball, and that’s where I first saw this really cute guy, and he ended up becoming my husband, Anthony. We’re both pitchers, and he had a college career at Middle Tennessee State. We’ve been married for 42 years, so that was a nice perk!”
A competitive nature led B.J. to embrace the role of a pitcher. “You’re the captain of the team out there, right? Everything starts and ends with what you do on the mound,” she says. “The mental battle never stops. If I walk somebody, I have to push ‘reset’ from batter to batter and inning to inning. Pitchers can’t take what happened in the prior inning back to the mound. We have to remain engaged the entire time and focus on one batter at a time.” She then adds, “I pray a lot on the mound.”
“My accuracy is not always what it should be,” she continues with a growing smile. But when I’m on, there’s nothing more exciting than striking someone out looking. I love that!”
Finding “Extra Innings” with Senior Games
In her late 40s, B.J. was playing on a women’s league team and was invited to play in the Nashville qualifier for the 2011 National Senior Games presented by Humana in Houston. She turned 50 in time to join the team and fell in love with her team experience.
B.J. continued playing regional tournaments with various teams until she was invited to join the East Coast Gems in 2018. The team, now in the 60+ division and called Gems Next Level, has kept its core players and found success, winning division gold medals at the National Senior Games in 2023 & 2025. They also have won gold the past two years against strong competition at the Huntsman World Senior Games.
“I love my teammates. These ladies started out as my friends, and now they’re my family,” she says. “When we play in Nashville, I live 45 minutes from the ballfield and will host teammates and a barbecue. One time, I had eight of my teammates come stay at my house, and I loved every minute of it.”
The Gems Next Level at the 2025 National Senior Games presented by Humana. Image courtesy Brenda Jones.
She says softball also taught her lessons about perseverance. “I ruptured my Achilles on my right foot during a softball game, and it was the hardest thing for me to be away from it,” she says. “But I appreciated the sport more, and it made me work harder to rehab so I could get back out here. So, even if a challenge comes, don’t be afraid of the challenge, because you can grow through it.”
The Author Emerges
B.J. has been writing poetry as a hobby since grade school, but during her banking career writing was mostly relegated to communications and analytical regulatory reports. Eventually, she was able to follow the dream of becoming an author and penned her first novel, “Not Yet a Woman,” which earned a Distinguished Favorite award for women’s literature in 2019.
Eight years later, she is still writing and has her own “W.C. Child” webpage. The third novel of her planned trilogy will be completed in 2026. She has also produced a spiritual guide and two books of poetry, but relishes being a storyteller. “I love the challenge. I like writing because I get to be somebody else through the characters.”
Speaking of being someone else, we asked why she uses W.C. Child as her pseudonym. “My father, Willmor Caldwell, never got a chance to see me publish a book. To honor him, my pen name stands for “Willmor Caldwell’s Child.”
Acting on a dream to become a writer in midlife has empowered Brenda to share advice with friends. “If you ever stop wanting to grow and take on new ideas, then you’re mentally defeated. It’s never too late,” she says, adding, “We also all need people around us. We were not meant to walk through this life alone. And even if we don’t always agree, I get to learn something about you, and you get to learn something about me.”
Watch an interview with Brenda at the 2025 National Senior Games presented by Humana below!
- Published in Athlete of the Month