Ageing Healthy or Ageing Happy

Ageing Healthy or Ageing Happy

No one can escape ageing - a process that everyone has to go through. Unless you have a way of living young, please let me know! In New Zealand, the Ministry of Health took ageing seriously into their hands. Throughout the years, the government had committed to ensure the healthy livelihood of New Zealanders so that they can live longer and more independently.

From the information I have currently gathered, health strategies for the ageing population in New Zealand are currently being coordinated across government agencies, but being led by the Ministry of Health (MOH). In December 2016, MOH released the Healthy Ageing Strategy – including 48 priority actions to be rolled out over the first two years. This is basically a revision of the same strategy that was implemented in 2002 to ensure that the new strategy will reflect current issues and opportunities for improving the health of older people. The  government is playing their role to improve the health outcomes and independence of older people as they made significant contribution to and have an integral role in our society. But will that be enough by implementing these Strategies?

One of the research found based just on physical activity experiments by Aoyagi et al.(2010), investigated the daily physical activities of older people by counting the steps they took and the intensity of effort in other types of physical activities they made, but there was a lack of objective evidence on the patterns of habitual physical activity associated with healthy ageing. To enhance health, the elders in this controlled group were recommended by the physical activity guidelines for older people proposed by the American College of Sports Medicine and the American Heart Association, that they should perform aerobic activities of moderate intensity for a minimum of 30 minutes on a 5 day week schedule.. However, this experiment setting was limited by a recruitment bias that tends to favour healthy members of the community in Nakanojo, Japan. In conclusion of the experiment, the team found that health-related quality of life in the elderly individuals scored higher when they spend a greater amount of time exercising leading to a healthier individual. These are but numbers, data and facts that did not tell us where older people's well-being is concerned are related to real healthy ageing or simply put, ageing happy.

In another research, the role of a Community Senior Center  (CSC) among older adults is explored. This research also examines how physical activity and exercises can be facilitated had implications that can lead to healthier older people and communities. However, Hickerson et al. (2008) mentioned that health overall is not merely the presence or absence of disease but a progression of all levels of vitality – meaning the relationships between health and leisure are intricately bound. This shows the role of the CSC is not just a place where the community go for physical activities but a place where social relationships are born and maintained.

Similar articles like these have been found and largely researched for the sake of getting to the bottom of how to support and empower the lives of the elderly in the society to age well, live healthy, independent and to have a respectful end of life. Hence, do you think that the government’s part in implementing the Strategy on the physical well-being of the elderly is enough? Should there be more to that? Or is it us, the rest of the community that should play another role?

http://www.health.govt.nz/publication/healthy-ageing-strategy

http://www.health.govt.nz/our-work/life-stages/health-older-people/healthy-ageing-strategy-update

http://www.health.govt.nz/publication/health-older-people-strategy-consultation-draft

http://health.govt.nz/our-work/life-stages/health-older-people/healthy-ageing-strategy-update/healthy-ageing-strategy-implementing-strategy

Aoyagi, Y., Park, H.T., Park, S.J., & Shephard, R.J. (2010).Habitual physical activity and health-related quality of life in older adults: interactions between the amount and intensity of activity (the Nakanojo Study). Qual Life Res 19, 333-338. doi: 10.1007/s11136-010-9588-6

Hickerson, B., Moore, A., Oakleaf, L., James, P.J., Swanson, J., & Henderson, K.A. (2008). The role of a senior center in promoting physical activity for older adults. Journal of Park and Recreation Administration, 26(1), 22-39.