Photo/Illutration Elderly people exercise to prevent frailty in Minami, Tokushima Prefecture, on Dec. 17, 2022. (Asahi Shimbun file photo)

Elderly people in Japan are getting “younger” in terms of health, likely due to being more socially active than previous generations, according to a recent survey.

These findings came from the Japan Gerontological Evaluation Study (JAGES), which is designed to examine the health of senior citizens nationwide.

The study followed two groups of senior citizens, six years apart, to see if the need for nursing care assistance had changed between the earlier and later groups.

It found that the more recent group showed a 25 to 27 percent decrease in the need for long-term care compared to the earlier group and attributed this change to increased social opportunities.

RISK DOWN OVER SIX YEARS

The first group study began in fiscal 2010.

All residents of the participating municipalities aged 65 and older, who had not been diagnosed as requiring nursing care, were surveyed about their health and living conditions. Follow-up surveys of this group continued for three years.

The second group study was conducted in the same way, in the same towns, starting in fiscal 2016.

A total of 23,000 residents were included in the fiscal 2010 study, while 26,000 were included in the fiscal 2016 study.

The team monitored how many people were classified as needing nursing care level 2 or higher during the follow-up periods. The differences between the two groups and their divergent outcomes were then analyzed.

The results showed that the 65- to 74-year-olds in the fiscal 2016 survey were 25 percent less likely to require nursing care than their fiscal 2010 counterparts, when the effects of educational backgrounds, personal medical histories and other elements were excluded.

Those aged 75 or over had a 27-percent lower risk of needing nursing care in the fiscal 2016 group.

These findings are consistent with the results of previous studies, which revealed that elderly people were becoming “younger,” or rather, retaining their physical abilities such as walking speed and grip strength better than the previous generations had.

This recent survey has confirmed that this same trend holds true about the need for long-term care.

SOCIAL ACTIVITIES THE KEY

Since socially active seniors are thought to be more likely to live without caregivers’ assistance, the research team projected what would have happened if there had been no difference in the degree of socialization between the two groups at the times of the questionnaires.

Social activities considered in this calculation included jobs and gatherings for hobbies and sports.

The team also assumed that indicators related to social participation, such as walking time and outing frequency, were the same.

The analysis results suggested that the need for nursing care would have been the same between the two groups had both been given the same amount of opportunities to socialize.

“By creating an environment where it is easy for elderly individuals to participate in society, a growing number of people may be able to stay ‘young’ regardless of age,” said Ryota Watanabe, a chief researcher of social epidemiology at Nihon Fukushi University, who compiled the research results.

The proportion of employed people in the survey increased from the fiscal 2010 group to the fiscal 2016 group both for 65- to 74-year-olds and those aged 75 or over.

The proportion of those participating in local organizations increased among those aged 75 or older, but dropped for 65- to 74-year-olds, apparently because more from that generation were employed.

The team concluded that increasing opportunities to socialize and therefore take strolls, venture out and meet with friends more frequently is contributing to the expanded population of youthful seniors.

The team’s findings have been published in the Journal of the American Medical Directors Association:  (https://www.jamda.com/article/S1525-8610(24)00045-8/fulltext).

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