Research on the Evaluation Index System of the Construction of Communities Suitable for Aging by the Fuzzy Delphi Method

Abstract

In order to cope with the rapidly aging society and the Chinese traditional idea of old-age care, community home-based care has become a major mode of care for the aged in China, and the construction of communities suitable for the aged has also become the focus of the whole society. In order to build an objective and scientific evaluation index system of communities suitable for aging, the hierarchical structure and relative important values of the indicators for the assessment were obtained through data text rooted coding and the fuzzy Delphi expert questionnaire survey. The results prove that: the evaluation index system of communities suitable for aging consists of 4 criteria (i.e., humanistic care, public environment, health care, and economic security), 14 sub-criteria, and 48 evaluation indexes. The important values of the four criteria are “health care” (7.35), “public environment” (7.18), “humanistic care” (6.92), and “economic security” (6.87). This shows that with the aging of the elderly and the decline of physical function, health care is the most important material basis for community home care, and is also the core criterion for the construction of communities suitable for aging. Of the 48 important values of the evaluation indexes, “setting up an emergency assistance system” (7.89), “ensuring the accessibility of roads” (7.79), and “handling related affairs” (7.60) ranked the highest. This shows that the protection of the physical and mental health of the elderly and the rights and interests of the elderly are the core values of the construction of communities suitable for aging. This study believes that through constructing an evaluation index system of the communities suitable for aging, the past general constructions suitable for aging according to the standard can be further clarified through the scientific procedure of the ‘community suitable for aging construction evaluation method’, and be a reference for the academic and practical fields.

Research on the establishment of evaluation index system of the aging construction of the community

“…According to the previous research results of this research team, the indicators of a community's aging construction under the community home-based care model are divided into four criteria: human care, public environment, health care, and social economy, and 48 indicators. The specific contents are shown in Table 1 ( 20 ). The purpose of this research is to explore the elderly's overall satisfaction with the community's aging construction, and to analyze the influencing factors, so as to build an evaluation index system of the aging construction of the community.…”

“…The “Five Lao-You” elderly care system proposed by Chinese academic circles since 1982, namely, “the old have security, the old have medical care, the old have learning resources, the old can achieve something, and the old have fun” is the Chinese aging policy and the earliest classification standard used in the research field ( 19 ). With the progress of the times and the development of society, especially the continuous improvement of the social pension security system, the socio-economic elderly care system developed based on the “Five Lao-You”, which is in line with China's national conditions, has become a common and recognized method of classification in the academic circles ( 20 ). It can be seen that the elderly's needs for aging care have gradually changed from “individual” to “social”, from “physical” to “spiritual”, and from “survivability” to “development”, which has been universally recognized by the international community.…”

Research on the Weighting Values of Community Aging-Friendly Construction Indexes With Different Expert Groups

“…3 As an essential part of the older adults’ pension, the ultimate goal of a community’s home-based older-adult care service is to comprehensively improve the service supply at the levels of community humanistic care, public environment, health care, and social economy, therefore improving the quality of life and older-adult care satisfaction of the older adults. 4 Whether the community older-adult care services and the aging-friendly constructions match the older adults’ needs, and whether the older adults’ diversified care needs are effectively met, are the essential factors affecting the development of the community’s home-based older-adult care industry. 5 Although economic growth and the improvement of community service levels make it possible to meet older-adult care needs, the heterogeneous characteristics of older-adult groups will produce a diversified demand focus, and increase the complexity of demand identification.…”

“…Therefore, enriching older adults’ social resources and improving their social security level is critical in developing the community’s home-based aging model and improving the community’s aging-friendly constructions. 4 …”

Assessment of Poverty by Municipalities in the Context of Population Ageing—The Case of Małopolskie Voivodeship

“…This is due to the increase in life expectancy and the phenomenon of double ageing, which means a longer life in retirement. Mei, Hsu, and Ou wrote about the need to provide economic support to the elderly in the conditions of the aging of the Chinese society [93]. The impact of changes in local authority spending on social care for older people, taking account of the important relationship between the National Health Service and social care services in meeting the needs of older people was examined by Humphries, Thorlby, Holder, Hall and Charles [94].…”