BACKGROUND

Population aging has been a critical issue around the world and people will have to face living problems when they get old. In Western countries, older people are more used to live alone or in institutions. In Eastern countries, due to filial piety of Chinese culture, the elderly prefer to live with their children or their relatives. There was no empirical study to investigate the relationship between health and living arrangement among older Taiwanese.

OBJECTIVE

This study was designed to explore the association between living arrangement and health characteristics among the elderly in Taiwan.

METHOD

This study used national representative data from the Taiwan Longitudinal Study on Aging surveyed in 2007. We identified 2621 elders aged older than 65 in 2007 and categorized them into 3 types of living arrangement by the questionnaire. Linear regressions were used to analyze the relationship between living arrangement and health status (activities of daily living [ADLs], instrumental activities of daily living [IADLs], and Center of Epidemiological Studies-depression [CES-D]) among the elderly.

RESULTS

Elderly individuals who indicated they rotationally lived with family members had poorer health conditions, including IADLs (Coeff = 0.23; 95% confidence interval [CI]: -0.06-0.52) and CES-D (Coeff = 0.41; 95% CI: -0.59-1.40), than those who steadily lived with family. In contrast, elderly individuals who lived alone had better health conditions in IADLs (Coefficient = -0.38; 95% CI: -0.53 to -0.22) than those who indicated they lived steadily with family.

CONCLUSIONS

These findings reveal that this type of rotational living is not a good living arrangement for the elderly.