There is a graying of the world. The number of older persons (age 50-70)has tripled over the past 50 years (World Population Aging 1950-2050,The UN 2002). In 2000, the number of countries with more than 10 million people aged 60 ar over increased to 12, including 5 with more than 20 million older people, China (129 million), India (77 million), and the United States of America (46 million).
The older population is growing faster than the total population in practically all regions of the world. In the mere developed countries, the proportion of older persons already exceeds that of choldren; by 2050it wil double (op cit).
With the increase in population, there is an increased number of elderly people in the rural and frontier areas. In the United States there are 65 million Americans who live in rural areas, over half of them are elderly (HHS Rural Task Force Report to the Secretary, July 2002). In the mid 1950's, the Eisenhower administration commissioned a task forct to examine the state of rural mental health in America. Its conclusion was grim; about 6% of the rural areas suffered from a shortage of mental health professionals. Several decades later, under the Carter adminstration anouther task force conducted a similar study and found that 60% of the rurall areas were still under-served. There are tremendous implications for this symposium in th nation (EE Benson, 2003).
Profile of the elderly in the rural areas include; 1. High prevalence of disease, limitation in the activities of daily living, high rate of chronic diseases (arrthritis, Alzheimer's, hypertension, diabetes, depression, anxiety disorders, alcoholism/substance abuse(Buckwalter 1991, Durenherger 1981, Cook H.L., et al. 1998, Besler WM, DJ Pobiner and Gh DeFriese 1998). Diseased and pathological diseases resulting from chemical insecticides, fertilizer and growth hormones.
2. Poverty- low income rural elderly.
3. Low literacy.
4. Low health
5. Lack of access to health care services and clinical specialist.
6. Inadequate reimbursement for health services from rural providers.
7. Lack of access to health services, social and vocational rehabilitation services, resources to enable the family caregiver to probice care and services, as well as a lack of clinical specialists.
8. The family is the primary caregiver.
9. Lack of research on the health of the rural elderly. In 1993, there were 1,00 citations relative to mental healrh in the rural areas (Gesler 1998).
In summary, the disease and care burden for the elderly in the rural world is on the family caregiver and more funds, research personnel, polices and clinical resources are imperative.
Back to S064 Health Care of the Elderly in the Rural and Frontier Areas (Globally and Domestically)
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