Supporting older people in bad times and good - guest blog
Alex O'Neil, Joseph Rowntree Foundation, 19 January 2011"The thing about That Bit Of Help is that, in a world where
we are faced with complex policy statements, it presents a case
that is simplicity itself, and as much as possible the aim now
should be to move on to how the spreading of the practice might be
achieved. It is no panacea but in the case of That Bit Of Help, it
was never meant to be. It is mainly as cheaply based, community
minded, civilised approach to helping people's wellbeing as there
could be. For older people’s lives it is for good times as
well as bad, and for services it is relevant in bad times as well
as good."
Stan Davison, Chair of the JRF Older People’s Steering
Group
We get caught up in the evidence-based, cost-effectiveness, outcome-defined, prevention discussion and lose sight of the basic message.
The 'outcome' that older people want is to have a life – their life.
JRF's project on 'That Bit Of Help' showed that if older people received support with simple tasks – gardening, laundry, housework, etc – they would be able to maintain their independence as well as a good quality of life, health and well-being.
Today's report by the Centre for Policy on Ageing looks at the imaginative, affordable and effective ways of supporting older people during a time of austerity and a growing population of older people.
We are not talking about huge aspirations but about what should be reasonable in any civilised society at this stage of the twenty-first century. There is an overwhelming body of evidence to show that people are more likely to retain all aspects of health (physical, emotional, psychological, spiritual) when there is mutuality, good human contact and support.
Likewise when these are withdrawn, it should not surprise that decline is often quite rapid with a consequential demand on 'illness' services. This is basic health promotion and could be judged on these merits alone.
Older people in the JRF Older People’s Steering Group rejected stereotypes . They said that growing older was about balancing gains and losses – and we needed to be honest about these. Ultimately it is about a civilised approach to growing older, not a luxury but about basic freedoms. Many of the approaches identified in today’s report, and in our original ‘Older People’s Inquiry into That Bit of Help’ are widely used by older people across the UK – in rural and urban localities – for quite modest amounts of money.
As Stan says, now’s the time to use our
imaginations.
This article was
first published on the Joseph Rowntree Foundation (JRF)
website