Health Care Systems Not Meeting Complex Needs of Seniors

As the world’s population rapidly ages and more seniors are living with multiple chronic health conditions, including mental health problems, and taking multiple medications, health care systems are under tremendous stress trying to meet the complex needs of this growing demographic.

For the first time in human history, the number of people over the age of 65 will soon surpass children under 5 and by 2050, it is anticipated the proportion of seniors will be more than double that of children under the age of 5.  Declining fertility rates combined with greater longevity will eventually mean that elderly adults who have traditionally relied on adult children for their care in old age will be faced with finding other support systems to lend help.  As previously reported on The Oldish, the number of aging seniors with complex comorbidities is expected to increase significantly. However, current health and social services are not yet up to the task, as a new study by the Canadian Institute for Health Information finds.

Researchers studied data from a 2016  Commonwealth Fund survey of seniors in 11 participating countries including Canada, the United States, France, Germany, Australia , Norway, Sweden, Switzerland, New Zealand, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom.  Their report was release earlier this month.

Almost 33 per cent of Canadian seniors surveyed reported their dissatisfaction with the quality of health care they received; a higher rate than the average 24 per cent recorded in the other participating countries.   In particular, older adults faced challenges in getting to their appointments and 1 in 5 said they had difficulty coping by themselves with their own care.  Seniors also reported receiving conflicting advice from different health care professionals.  The study recommends creating a way to easily share important information about symptom flare ups noticed by home care workers or other providers to a primary care doctor, catching changes in health early in order to better manage care.   Including specialists in the regular care of seniors, rather than waiting an average of 3 months for a referral, is also a possible solution proposed by the report. 

Creating more age-friendly communities with better access to transportation and community centers where seniors can participate in regular physical and social activities is also part of greater solution, according to researchers.  

To learn more about the survey results, follow this link to the CIHI website.

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