Older migrants’ use of elderly care in Sweden: family affects choice between home help services and special housing

Abstract

Swedish elderly care consists mainly of two forms of care: home help services and special housing. The aim of this paper is to investigate and analyse how and to what extent older migrants use different forms of elderly care and to explore whether, and if so why, this is the case. The article uses a mixed method that combines a quantitative and a qualitative research approach. The study comprises statistics on the total population of elderly persons using home help services and special housing, and 10 telephone interviews with care managers. The results show that while Nordic migrants have similar patterns access to elderly care to Swedes, older migrants from the Middle East and Africa use home help services to a similar extent to older Swedes, but refrain from use of special housing due to the greater accessibility of home help services and the help they receive from family and relatives. To understand this disparity, the study highlights the role of filial piety and family obligation, which prescribe how the family should take care of elderly family members. The results show that the family significantly influences an elderlýs choice of public forms of care in ways that fit its preferences.

People living with dementia using eldercare in Sweden

“…According to NBHW (2021), in Sweden, almost every fifth person over 65 years old (20%) is foreign-born. Traditionally, the families with different ethnic backgrounds, especially those who come outside of Europe, often prefer family care to professional care (Songur, 2021). In many cultures, it is expected that care and support for the elderly member of the family will come from family members such as spouse or adult children and relatives.…”

“…In many cultures, it is expected that care and support for the elderly member of the family will come from family members such as spouse or adult children and relatives. Several Swedish studies found that older migrants from the Middle East and Africa were more refrain from using public eldercare services compared to Nordic migrants or older Swedes (Antelius & Plejert, 2016;Songur, 2021). The role of filial piety and moral or family obligation were two main factors that significantly influence the choice of public eldercare for migrant families (Antelius & Plejert, 2016;Kiwi et al, 2018).…”

A challenging responsibility - care for older parents in Turkish immigrant families

“…Installing older parents in a nursing home can be considered the epitome of not providing intergenerational support. A reluctance to use such homes in ethnic minority families has been documented in studies from Sweden (Songur, 2019;Stroh et al, 2022), and from other geographical contexts (Ahaddour et al, 2018;Albertini & Mantovani, 2021;Greenwood & Smith, 2019). Research from Denmark documents that, in some immigrant families, adult children end up developing rotational care schemes to keep old parents out of nursing homes.…”

Aging with My Family: A Grounded Theory on the Role of Family when Aging as Foreign-born

“…Studies of non-European migrant groups in England and Wales indicate that family remains central in the provision of care and support for these ethnic minority older people [9,10]. Even in Sweden, feelings of family obligation and norms of lial piety are strong among families with Middle East origins [11,12], and family decisions affect older foreign-born's use of public service [13,14,15].…”

“…However, little knowledge exists on how these older foreign-born in Sweden experience their overall living conditions [22]. The role of family for older foreign-born has been studied only in the context of care provision [13,14,15]. Almost all these studies were conducted from the perspective of care managers who had met the older people together with their families and assessed their needs for social support or in a few cases that of nurses who worked at residential care for older people.…”