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Characterising Long Term Care Needs among Chinese Older Adults with Cognitive Impairment or ADL Limitations

Journal of Cross-Cultural Gerontology volume 35, pages 35–47 (2020)Cite this article

Abstract

This study analyses long-term care needs (LTC) in the context of older adults who face limitations in activities of daily living (ADL) or with cognitive impairment (CI), and thus need aids to fulfil daily activities. Drawing on data from three waves (2002, 2005, 2008/09) of the Chinese Longitudinal Healthy Longevity Survey (CLHLS), this study shows that the older adults aged 65 to 99 with ADL limitation declined over the years from 8% to 5% but those with CI increased from 11% to 17%. Overall, about 16% of the older adults reported LTC needs in the baseline year of 2002, and this subsequently increased to 20% in 2008/09. Results from random-effects parametric survival-time models indicate that social factors such as low income, inadequate medical services, a lack of social support and social activities as well as being spouseless tend to significantly increase the hazard of developing LTC needs for the Chinese older adults.

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Acknowledgements

Most of the work in this paper was done at the Asia Research Institute (ARI), National University of Singapore. The author would like to acknowledge ARI for its support. This study has also benefited from the comments by Professor Jean Yeung (National University of Singapore) and Professor Zhenzhen Zheng (The Chinese Academy of Social Sciences). Data used for this research was provided by the study entitled “Chinese Longitudinal Healthy Longevity Survey” (CLHLS) managed by the Center for Healthy Aging and Development Studies, Peking University. CLHLS is supported by funds from the U.S. National Institutes on Aging (NIA), China Natural Science Foundation, China Social Science Foundation, and UNFPA.

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  1. Duke-NUS Medical School, 8 College Road, Singapore, 169857, Singapore

    Yi Yang

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Yang, Y. Characterising Long Term Care Needs among Chinese Older Adults with Cognitive Impairment or ADL Limitations. J Cross Cult Gerontol 35, 35–47 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10823-019-09382-8

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Keywords

  • ADL
  • China
  • Cognitive impairment
  • Long-term care