Abstract
Purpose Malaysia is considered to be a relatively young country as compared to other older countries such as Japan, China and Australia in terms of the ageing population. However, until 2035, Malaysia will be in the ageing group countries as 15% of the entire population will be above 60 years of age. This situation is quite alarming as more and more ageing care centres will be required to fulfill the ongoing demands of the ageing population. The elderly care centres in Malaysia are categorised as public (sponsored by the government), private, and charity based that comes under religious centres. Currently, there are about 365 registered elderly care centres working in the main states of Malaysia, including Sabah and Sarawak, two states of the East Malaysia. Due to the importance of ageing population issues, the present study is conducted to explore the demographics facet of Malaysian’s elderly care centres. The main reason behind that lies on the fact that many of these centres are still labelled as being not well equipped and lacking behind in trained staff, equipment and also suffering from severe financial constraints but some still capable of working on a sustainability basis. Design/methodology/approach Qualitative Research Strategy has been adopted, and 28 centres throughout Malaysia are included in this study. About 18 Operators from different centres and 15 caregivers were interviewed to get the holistic view of ageing care and facilities in their respective centres. Findings The results highlight that the majority of centres are not receiving any financial help from the government, and few centres are doing small business such as supplying consumable medical and non-medical items and providing renting and rehabilitation centres facilities to sustain. The caregivers are facing issues such as excess workload, less salary, peer conflicts and non-cooperative centre leadership. Originality/value The present study may help to provide useful information to the policymakers, which enables them to formulate the strategies for ageing care centres in Malaysia. As this study provides insight of components that have an impact on the overall wellbeing of elderly care centres, hence, it could help the care services providers to act as a rising star for Malaysian’s social life comfort.
Highlights
Ageing population is a worldwide phenomenon, and it affects all traits of human life
Because of drastic demographic changes in various countries worldwide, older people become significant in development agendas
This leads towards a new prototype of research on elderly care centre
Summary
Ageing population is a worldwide phenomenon, and it affects all traits of human life. A report highlights that until 2050, the world population will increase from 8 to 9.6 billion, and this will post a significant challenge in the countries all across the globe (Amiri, 2018), including Malaysia. The elderly people are expected to be tripled from the year 1980 (259 million) to year 2025 (761 million); while about 72% of the entire elderly population are residing in developing countries. A representative of a developing country, has been estimated to have about 5% of its entire population to be 60 years of age and above by year 2030 (Department of Statistics Malaysia, 2018). The ageing is a continuous process, and another report shows that until 2030, Malaysia will be in the same line of other ageing group countries e.g. Japan, USA and China (Phua et al, 2019; Rashid and Tahir, 2015). Older population needs more health-care facilities and attention, and elderly care centres are considered the key players in promoting healthy ageing among the elderly segment
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Free) 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a call
