Search results

Purpose – Academic campuses in India in recent years have witnessed an increase in the proportion of older people due to the rise in the age of superannuation of faculty and their cohabitation with older parents. However, such campuses continue to have a skewed program which favor the needs of the younger population. For the present study, a residential academic campus equipped with a health care facility was selected to understand the challenges of the family caregivers of older people residing in it.

Methodology/Approach – Exploratory in-depth interviews were conducted with 154 family caregivers. Secondary data were obtained from the campus hospital records.

Findings – Data revealed that family caregivers experienced various challenges in providing older care in the campus due to unavailability of paid supportive caregivers, lack of community support, and inadequate housing. Though the academic campus has a health care facility, the entitlement rights to it varies among the older people in campus. While the campus health facility was not congenial for family caregiving, it was utilized as a space for providing long-term care. This chapter suggests the need to extend a public heath model of family caregiving in campus.

Research limitations/implications – The study has implication for modifying similar academic campuses in India for facilitating family caregivers of older people.

Originality/Value of Paper – This is the first study of its kind which explored the challenges of family caregiving for older people in academic campuses in India.

Purpose: To explore emotional support, daily housework assistance, and economic support for older adults provided by the Vietnamese family within the context of the impacts of socio-economic, demographic, and other factors.

Methodology: (1) The researchers used data from censuses taken from 1989 to 2019; national surveys of Internal Migration, Labor and Employment and other topics; and recent large sample sociological surveys (2) adapted a modified Diamond Care Model (Ochiai, 2009) to analyze effects of the characteristics of older adults; and of the country’s laws, policies, and socio-economic changes, on the families’ caregiving activities supporting the older adults.

Findings: The family is still the most important institution providing care for older adults in Viet Nam. Most older people live with their children and see this as an age-old security solution despite differences related to lifestyles and interests. However, when the average number of working-age people per older person decreases, as older adults live longer, household sizes are smaller, and there is increased large migration, the demand for non-family caregiving for older adults will increase. Since social services to help meet this demand are limited, the traditional family support system for the elderly in Viet Nam will face many challenges as families try to assure the quality of care needed in the very near future.

Value: This chapter shows systematically a relationship between elderly care in the Vietnamese family and socio-economic, demographic, and associated factors based on comprehensive data sources. The results can help us think about how to create an appropriate future model for taking care of older adults in Viet Nam that combines the efforts of families and the support of comprehensive social policies by the community.

Barbados is at a very advanced stage of population aging. Health care services are designed to ensure universal access for all Barbadians but the contributing factors for older adults’ health care utilization are not well explored. This chapter examines gender differences in the correlates of seeking medical care among older adults in Barbados.

Logistic regression models were applied to data drawn from the 2000 Survey of Health, Well-Being and Aging of Older Adults in Latin America and the Caribbean (SABE), Bridgetown sample (n = 1,068).

Health needs, based on chronic conditions, were positively associated with seeking medical care for men and women. Different forms and directions of intergenerational support were associated with men and women seeking care. Among men, receiving financial support was positively associated with seeking care. Among women, providing financial support was associated with lower odds of seeking care while receiving instrumental support was associated with higher odds of seeking care.

Medical care is only one form of health care use and there is no specification of the nature of care or consultation. The sample is cross-sectional and limited to older adults in urban areas. The relative importance of enabling factors and health needs, especially, may differ across time and space within Barbados.

The study contributes to the literature on health care utilization among older adults within developing countries and highlights the pertinence of family relations influencing gender differences in health care utilization.

United Kingdom and China face both similar and dissimilar challenges in managing eldercare. These challenges are centred around demographic change, caregiving roles and care facilities, work–family conflict and work flexibilities, employment rights, culture norms in caring for the elders and the welfare state. This chapter demonstrates the status quo of each of these challenges in managing eldercare, from both the East and West perspectives. Aside from the challenges, opportunities also emerge. More support services are needed for elders with activities of daily living (ADL) or instrumental activities of daily living. Institutional care is in great demand in China, despite the traditional value of caring for elders at home. Caring for elders with cognitive disabilities has also won attention. In the United Kingdom, elder caregiving issues are focused on older workforce, grandparent caregivers and long-term consequences of combining employment and care in the workplace. Compared to Hong Kong and United Kingdom, mainland China has more space to improve on adapting flexible work hours and promoting employment rights of workers. ‘Sandwich’ carers and women caregivers were given special attention in our discussion. At the end of the chapter, results from a survey studying older employees who are also caregivers were also presented.

Purpose: The aim is to explore how family relations are affected by societal changes in relation to informal and formal caregiving and self-determination of older adults.

Design/methodology/approach: Care managers (CMs)/social workers (SWs) (N = 124) participated in a comparative vignette study including Japan, South Korea, and Sweden. Systems theory was used.

Findings: Japanese CMs/SWs clearly describe their efforts to create networks in a relational way between formal and informal actors in the community. South Korean CMs/SWs balance between suggesting interventions to support daily life at home or a move to a nursing home, often acknowledging the family as the main caregiver. In Sweden, CMs/SWs highlight the juridical element in meeting the older adult and the interventions offered, and families primarily give social support. Regarding self-determination, the Japanese priority is for CMs/SWs to harmonize within the family and the community. South Korean CMs/SWs express ambivalent attitudes to older adults’ capability for self-determination in the intersection between formal and family care. Swedish CMs/SWs adhere to the older adult’s self-determination, while acknowledging the role of the family in persuading the older adult to accept interventions. The results suggest emerging defamilialization in South Korea, while tendencies to refamilialization are noticed in Japan and Sweden, albeit in different ways.

Research limitations/implications: In translation, nuances may be lost. A focus on changing families shows that country-specific details in care services have been reduced. For future research, perspectives of “care” need to be studied on different levels.

Originality/value: Using one vignette in three countries with different welfare regimes, discussing changing views on families’, communities’ and societal caregiving is unique. This captures changes in policy, influencing re- and defamilialization.

This chapter discusses challenges faced by older adult health-care consumers in obtaining access to responsive care from physicians relevant to a broad spectrum of health issues ranging from prevention to chronic illness and end-of-life care. Based on our prior research with community-dwelling elders (E. Kahana & B. Kahana, 2003, 2010), we propose a conceptual model of consumer self-advocacy for better access to effective health care in late life. We argue that older adults who are well informed and confident health-care partners and who involve their physicians in active dialogue will experience better care, and will be more satisfied with their health care. We present findings from our studies of cancer prevention and from our research focused on end-of-life care relevant to patient self-advocacy. We also discuss the role of educational interventions and of patient empowerment in facilitating greater access to responsive health communication and health care, particularly among elders who are disadvantaged and who have low health literacy.

To describe, analyze, and compare two long-term care (LTC) systems for elders in Germany and Israel.

Secondary analyses of data on LTC beneficiaries, structure of service provision and content analyses of policy documents in a comparative perspective based on the Esping-Andersen welfare state typologies.

Descriptive background of demographic attributes in the two countries; discussion of LTC development laws which in Israel focuses on “aging in place” concept, where in-kind services are geared only to community-dwelling frail elders while in Germany it’s for community and institutionalized elders. Analyses of various service types provided their use, resources invested, and benefits incurred for frail elders and their family caregivers.

The advantages and shortcomings of the two systems were analyzed with recommendations for future developments. Such comparisons across nations can inform social policy debates in Germany and Israel as to how to prepare for population aging. The originality of such comparison can shed light on issues for LTC service development in other countries.

Inequalities in health and health care by gender for older adults are often hidden because much data concerning the older adult are not disaggregated by gender. Older women are more likely to have chronic diseases that disable but do not kill. Older men are more likely to have chronic diseases that kill but do not disable for long periods of time. A gender analysis is used to elaborate inequalities by gender in two situations. The first is that of post-hospital care under Medicare. The second is a detailed analysis of living arrangements men and women over 85 years in the community based on the U.S. Census data for 2000. Combined with a population health model, a gender analysis indicates unequal access to health care and well-being by gender as well as unequal control over the provision of necessary care.