Youth Participation in Home Care for the Elderly

Rosimere Ferreira

doi:10.4172/2167-7182.s3-006

Abstract

This article aims to define the participation of young people (ages 14 through 19) in elderly care and to analyze young people’s thoughts about aging, care, and intergenerationality. Study quantitative-qualitative cross-sectional, included 343 youths with elderly care participation. The major activities were bureaucratic (12.2%), medications and food (14.3%) and companionship (14.6%). The perception regarding “taking care of someone” was positive in 80.8%; when the genders were compared, men and women were found to view caregiving roles differently (p=0.048). The young people providing home care for the elderly is increasing in contemporary society, highlighting the necessity of gerontological education.

Highlights

Demographic data show a decrease in birth rates and the likelihood of a more even age distribution [1]
This trend requires social adjustments and adaptive measures to suppress the need for elderly care and the financial dependence that is caused by the later inclusion of youths in the labor market [2,3,4,5]
The family incomes were divided into two groups: 75.8% (260) of the participants came from families who earned up to twice the monthly minimum wage, while 18.7% (64) of the respondents reported that they had family incomes between two and five times the minimum wage

Summary

Introduction

Demographic data show a decrease in birth rates and the likelihood of a more even age distribution [1]. This trend requires social adjustments and adaptive measures to suppress the need for elderly care and the financial dependence that is caused by the later inclusion of youths in the labor market [2,3,4,5]. In addition to financial dependence, multigenerational cohabitation is associated with changes in family structure, such as divorce, same-sex marriage, the growing role of women in the labour market [2,8,9,10], and the need for emotional or health care support. Family members are generally the first choice to care for vulnerable individuals, and women, children and spouses are chosen primarily because personal and emotional relationships over time tend to determine interpersonal relationships as humans grow older [10,11,12,13]

Methods

Results

Discussion

Conclusion