By Tom Weber
Creve Coeur, MO – Washington University researchers are using an area of St. Louis County as the site for a study on what elderly people need to live independently.
The area near the Jewish Community Center in Creve Coeur has a large percentage of elderly people and has been named one of nation's first Naturally Occurring Retirement Communities, or NORC's.
John Morris with Washington University's Center for Aging says no one has studied such communities to see what elderly people need to continue to live independently.
Morris says the goal of the research is to come up with cost-effective things older communities should have to delay as long as possible the need for residents to move to costly nursing homes.