1 in 3 will be older adults by 2025 in Japan

In June Dr Mayumi Hayashi described Japan's vision of 'total care' for its older population in HSJ. The article that prompts this post follows another with lessons for England.

Referring to a "2025 vision" this forward thinking has its roots in established systems of healthcare set up in 1961 and social care established in 2000 (p.25).

Care integration is not new as a fundamental issue in health and social care. It is for me a career legacy issue. As a student nurse it was discussed and debated, closely allied with multidisciplinary and holistic (joined up physical and mental health) care. Even now 37 years later it will drive many arguments and policy deliberations in the run up to the next election here.

Many nations are faced with stark demographics. As the population ages and works its way through wooden blocks, Rubik cubes, it is the population pyramid that takes on increasing significance.


Dr Hayashi lists the need for inclusion, integration and continuation of four components that are essential to the realisation of this vision:

• maximising the integration of healthcare and social care;
• promoting policies for prevention and outreach together with safeguarding;
• embedding supported living programmes and dementia friendly community initiatives; and
• addressing “late life specific” housing needs.

I have mapped these to Hodges' model below:

individual
INTERPERSONAL : SCIENCES

humanistic ------------------------------------------- mechanistic

SOCIOLOGY : POLITICAL

group

embedding supported living programmes and dementia friendly community initiatives	integration of health and social care
"late life specific" housing needs (integration of health and social care)	promoting policies for prevention and outreach, together with safeguarding

It becomes clear to see in Japan, China and other nations how telecare and smart homes have a role to play. Getting the basics of integrated care resolved firstly is the prerequisite whatever the culture.

Where achieved the integration of health and social care can act as a diagonal brace as it straddles two care domains. Perhaps the model also reflects the ongoing challenges of parity in esteem in mental health care and physical care; and the funding ambiguity for people living with dementia as opposed to other medical conditions?

In January 2014 the FT Weekend magazine also featured an article on ageing in Japan.

Hayashi, M. (2014) Japan's vision of a 'total care' future looks bright, Health Service Journal, 124, 6404, 25-27. 

FT magazine cover image:
https://www.facebook.com/financialtimes/photos/a.10150157857040750.297340.8860325749/10152119294570750/?type=1

Conference: Design as Caring in an Urban World - Final Call for Papers

Design as caring in an urban world: Royal Geographical Conference, London, Tuesday 26 to Friday 29 August 2014

In his essay, “Building, Dwelling, Thinking”, Heidegger considers the interrelationships between care and design by arguing that we are only capable of building well when we know how to dwell, that is, cultivating attachments to our environments and, through this cultivation, giving and receiving care. Recent work in areas such as urban and cultural geographies, and science and technology studies, has further elaborated on this connection between care and design by exploring the affective and relational work that goes into shaping and repairing the fragile attachments between the human and non-human materials that compose the urban world. At the same time, the materiality of urban environments is often found to be inattentive to human difference and diversity, and rarely shaped by, or exposed to, a caring design ethic.

In this session, we seek to bring concepts and practices of care and design into a closer dialogue with one another in order to develop new ways of thinking about the (co) production of urban environments. It is our belief that now, more than ever, a rethinking is required about the relationships between urban design and care, as issues such as sustainability and inclusivity ask for modes of designing and dwelling that convey the affective and relational sensibilities and values of caring.

We are interested in stimulating an exchange of ideas and inspirations between urban design and care by engaging with the ways in which caring skills and sensibilities can become expressed through design practice and thinking, and also the ways in which caring knowledge can be a resource for reconfiguring urban spaces. The questions explored in the session include, but are not limited to, the following:

• How is caring embedded and expressed in daily encounters between people and urban environments, including buildings, spaces and technologies?
• What kinds of skills and values of urban design do these encounters cultivate and what can be done to make public and support these?
• How can an ethics and politics of care and caring be instilled into the design of places and what does a caring design ethic refer to and entail for practice?
• What are the pedagogic and practical challenges in creating caring design values and practices?
• How could an ethics and politics of care be mobilised as a form of constructive critique of current urban design discourses where the sensibilities and values of care have often received less attention?

Session convenors: Charlotte Bates, Rob Imrie, and Kim Kullman

Please send a proposed abstract of 200-300 words to Charlotte Bates (c.bates AT gold.ac.uk) or Kim Kullman (k.kullman AT gold.ac.uk) by February 19th 2014.

a reflection on relaxation or ...?

INTERPERSONAL : SCIENCES
humanistic ------------------------------------- mechanistic
SOCIOLOGY : POLITICAL

individual

group - population

Quotation Search:
http://www.quotationspage.com/search.php3?homesearch=lying+down&startsearch=Search

Recent Advances in Research on Housing Transitions and the Life Course - a one-day symposium

Meeting of the Royal Statistical Society Social Statistics section.
DATE: Tuesday 10 December 2013
TIME: 10am-5pm (followed by a drinks reception)
LOCATION: Royal Statistical Society, 12 Errol Street, London EC1Y 8LX

We are pleased to announce a one-day symposium on recent developments in research on housing transitions through the life course.  The event will feature presentations from leading international demographers, geographers and economists on different aspects of housing careers. Topics include:

• the interrelationship between housing and fertility: childbearing patterns by housing conditions and housing changes after the birth of a child
• wage, employment and house-price effects on migration
• intergenerational transmission of home ownership and neighbourhood poverty
• residential mobility, neighbourhood poverty dynamics and neighbourhood choice among families

The symposium is sponsored by the ESRC-funded project “Interrelationships between housing transitions and fertility” (see http://www.bristol.ac.uk/cmm/research/housing for further details). 

SPEAKERS:
William A.V. Clark (University of California, Los Angeles) Clara Mulder (University of Groningen), Heather Joshi (Institute of Education) Hill Kulu (University of Liverpool) David Manley (University of Bristol) Birgitta Rabe (University of Essex) Elizabeth Washbrook (University of Bristol)

A programme and abstracts are at http://www.bristol.ac.uk/cmm/research/housing/symposium/index.html

REGISTRATION AND QUERIES: All are welcome and attendance is free.  Refreshments will be provided, including lunch and a drinks reception.  However, advance registration is essential.  Please complete the online registration form at http://www.cmm.bris.ac.uk/clients/booking/91/ to reserve your place.

[ I mentioned to the organisers about the ongoing transitions I have posted about before; that of older adults moving house (home) often in response to a bereavement to be nearer other family members. This is not the symposium's focus, but remains a question in terms of the potential impact on the individuals concerned and health and social services. pj ]

50 years "I have a dream..."

INTERPERSONAL : SCIENCES

SOCIOLOGY : POLITICAL

individual

"I have a dream!"	Do things and science and technology have to dictate humanity's dreams?
We have a dream...	A man had a dream...

group - population