A Study on the Health Status of Elderly Irular Tribal Women in Kancheepuram District

Abstract

Indian tribals are a heterogeneous group; most of them remain at the lowest stratum of the society due to various factors like geographical and cultural isolation, low levels of literacy, primitive occupations, and extreme levels of poverty. The present paper attempts to study the health problems of the elderly Irular women in three villages of Kancheepuram district. A total of 30 elderly tribal were interviewed using a pre-tested Interview schedule. Around 66% of the women belonged to the age group of 60-69 years old. A majority of them had health problems such as hypertension followed by arthritis, diabetes, constipation etc. The results of the study showed that there is a need for geriatric clinics that can take care of their physical and psychological needs. It further stressed accessibility of health services as a main reason for the elderly not availing the health care services. The study also suggested provision of mobile clinic to cater to the needs of the community every month on a selected date on a regular basis. Keywords: Health status, Tribal women I. INTRODUCTION Ageing is mainly associated with social isolation, poverty, apparent reduction in family support, inadequate housing, impairment of cognitive functioning, mental illness, widowhood, loss, bereavement, limited options for living arrangement and dependency towards end of life. Generally, at household level, cultural norms and practices and socio-economic factors determine the extent of health problems among women. Change in socio-economic status and various health problems adversely affect an individual's way of life during old age. In India the size of the elderly population, i.e. persons above the age of 60 years is fast growing although it constituted only 7.4% of total population at the turn of the new millennium. For a developing country like India, this may pose mounting pressures on various socio economic fronts including pension outlays, health care expenditures, fiscal discipline, savings levels etc. Again this segment of population faces multiple medical and psychological problems. India is home to almost half the tribal population of the world. Tribals are characterized by a distinctive culture, primitive traits, and socio-economic backwardness. The tribal's of India, constituting 8.2% of the total population (84 million), belong to around 698 communities or clans. Around 75 of these groups are called primitive tribal groups due to pre-agricultural level of knowledge, extreme backwardness, and a dwindling population. However, the exact number of tribal groups may be lesser than 500 due to group-overlapping in more than one state. Although scheduled tribes are accorded special status under the fifth/sixth schedules of the Indian Constitution, their status on the whole, especially their health still remains unsatisfactory. Tribal communities in general and primitive tribal groups in particular are highly disease prone. Also they do not have required access to basic health facilities. They are most exploited, neglected, and highly vulnerable to diseases with high degree of malnutrition, morbidity and mortality (Balgir, 2004(1)). Their misery is compounded by poverty, illiteracy, ignorance of causes of diseases, hostile environment, poor sanitation, lack of safe drinking water and blind beliefs, etc. Some of the preventable diseases such as tuberculosis, malaria, gastroenteritis, filariasis, measles, tetanus, whooping cough, skin diseases (scabies), etc. are also high among the tribals. Some of the diseases of genetic origin reported to be occurring in the Indian tribal population are sickle cell anemia, alpha- and beta- thalassemia, glucose-6-phosphate dehydrogenase (G6PD) deficiency, etc. (Balgir, 2004(2)). Night blindness, sexually transmitted diseases are well known public health problems of tribals in India. This paper explores the Health problems of the elderly in the Irular Tribal women. It also explores the accessibility and availability of public health services to these disadvantaged women in the tribal population at Kancheepuram district of Tamilnadu and suggests solutions.