Online CPR Certification Blog
Health care needs for the oldest old population
Date: October 10th, 2015
Men have fewer chronic ailments
Even though the likelihood of women hitting 100 years is four times that of men, they are more prone to suffering from broken bones or developing a couple of chronic health problems like loss of hearing or vision or incontinence as reported by the British researchers. Men reduced chronic ailments. The lead researcher, Nisha Hazra noted that they found a greatly surprising number of many 100 year olds that had no major illnesses. But with the continued increase of people with 100 years, it is crucial to understand that the oldest old have health care needs that have evolved greatly and are certainly more demanding. This finding will help to project the health care cost accurately that the aging population is associated with.
The public health records
To reach these findings, an analysis of over 11,000 centenarians was done in U.K on the public health records in their efforts of investigating the various health issues that affect the older population like stroke, diabetes arthritis and cancer. In addition to this, the researchers also undertook an examination of health risks related to age that included dementia, falls, vision issues and broken bones. There was a 50 percent increase in the number of women past 100 years from 1990 to 2013 as found out by the study in comparison to the 30% increase among men.
The researchers also were quick to note that nearly all the centenarians involved in the study had a high likelihood of being diagnosed with chronic issues albeit nonfatal like arthritis unlike diseases that are more serious like diabetes and cancer as noted in the study. What these findings seem to suggest is that there is heavy reliance of the older people on medical services something that is speculated to increase in the future.
This is believed to dramatically affect the cost of health care as noted by the authors. The researchers also noted that there was need for more research in order to understand why there are certain people who tend to reach a very old age without any serious health problems while some don’t. There is need to undertake more research in the future in order to understand how these implications can help in development of health care services.