Strategies for maintaining the individual health of the elderly: urban and rural contexts

Abstract

The article discusses the features that, in the regional aspect, influence the choice of various strategies for the preservation of individual health by older people. It is concluded that the individual health of the elderly depends on the specific social environment, as well as on individual psychological and physiological factors, on the level of activity and autonomy in decision-making. The study was conducted by the Sociological Institute of the RAS – branch of the FCTAS RAS from March to September 2022 in two regions of the Russian Federation: St. Petersburg and rural areas of the Republic of Karelia. The main research method used was semi-structured interviews, the approach to analysing interview data was thematic. One of the results of the analysis is the identification of specific factors of two health preservation strategies typical for older people: self-help, with distinctive features of autonomy in the social environment, the poor financial situation of representatives of this strategy and their search for alternative methods of treatment; and a care strategy related to older people’s trust in institutional medicine, their experience in managing a chronic disease, and their higher financial status. The results of the study allow us to conclude that when choosing a particular strategy, older people are guided by such factors as the level of trust in the social environment in general and profess ional medicine in particular, individual psychological and emotional aspects of ideas about maintaining one’s health and the level of personal material well-being.