Pego Maria Ana, Nunes Carla
Unidade de Investigação e Desenvolvimento em Enfermagem, Escola Superior de Enfermagem de Lisboa, Lisbon, Portugal.
Centro de Investigação em Saúde Pública, Escola Nacional de Saúde Pública, Universidade Nova de Lisboa, Lisbon, Portugal.
Front Med (Lausanne). 2018 Jan 16;4:255. doi: 10.3389/fmed.2017.00255. eCollection 2017.
Aging is pushing states to rethink long-term care policies in several dimensions. This study aims to characterize the reality of dependent older people regarding their demographic and health characteristics, to describe their informal carers and understand the availability of informal care.
A cross-sectional study was developed in Portugal in 2013. Descriptive statistical analyses and binary logistic analysis were conducted.
Results show that the informal long-term care sector is primarily aimed at older people with severe limitations in their activities of daily living and at the chronically ill, particularly older women. Additionally, 39.5% of dependent older persons do not have informal care and only receive informal aid in cases of extreme need.
Results show a critical situation for both social groups (older persons and caregivers) and the prospect of an alarming situation in the near future (aging and reduced availability of informal caregivers) unless a new approach for long-term care is developed.
老龄化促使各国在多个层面重新思考长期护理政策。本研究旨在描述依赖他人照顾的老年人在人口统计学和健康特征方面的实际情况，描述他们的非正式护理人员，并了解非正式护理的可获得性。
2013年在葡萄牙开展了一项横断面研究。进行了描述性统计分析和二元逻辑分析。
结果显示，非正式长期护理部门主要针对日常生活活动严重受限的老年人和慢性病患者，尤其是老年女性。此外，39.5%的依赖他人照顾的老年人没有非正式护理，仅在极端需要的情况下接受非正式援助。
结果表明这两个社会群体（老年人和护理人员）都面临严峻形势，并且除非制定新的长期护理方法，否则在不久的将来可能出现令人担忧的情况（老龄化和非正式护理人员可获得性降低）。
