National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) Centre of Research Excellence: Frailty and Healthy Ageing, University of Adelaide, Adelaide, South Australia, Australia; Adelaide Geriatrics Training and Research with Aged Care Centre, Adelaide Medical School, University of Adelaide, South Australia, Australia.
National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) Centre of Research Excellence: Frailty and Healthy Ageing, University of Adelaide, Adelaide, South Australia, Australia; Hugo Centre for Migration and Population Research, School of Social Sciences, University of Adelaide, Adelaide, South Australia, Australia.
Exp Gerontol. 2019 Aug;123:57-65. doi: 10.1016/j.exger.2019.05.010. Epub 2019 May 23.
Detailed information about the current and future geographic distribution of Australia's frail population provides critical evidence to inform policy, resource allocation and planning initiatives that aim to treat and reverse frailty. Frailty is associated with poor health outcomes, including disability and death. It is also characterised by increased health care usage and costs. Understanding the distribution and growth of frailty is important for planning and budgeting service provision and health interventions aimed to support the needs of Australia's growing ageing population. The objective of this research is to provide baseline mapping and area level population estimates of Australia's current and future frail and pre-frail populations.
Geospatial modelling was applied to national frailty prevalence rates to provide estimates of the size, distribution and potential growth of Australia's frail and pre-frail population.
It is estimated that in 2016 approximately 415,769 people living in Australia aged 65 years or more are frail and almost 1.7 million people are pre-frail. In future years, as the population ages, these figures will increase rapidly, reaching 609,306 frail and 2,248,977 pre-frail by 2027, if prevalence continues at current levels. The geographic distribution of this projected growth is not uniform and while the largest frail populations will continue to be located in the major cities, the fastest growth will be in the outer metropolitan, regional and remote areas.
The projected growth of frail populations in outer metropolitan, regional and remote areas may be reduced by targeting health interventions in these areas and improving access to support services. Frailty is a dynamic condition that is amenable to intervention. Reducing frailty will lead to benefits in wellbeing for older Australians in addition to reductions in health care costs.
详细了解澳大利亚脆弱人群当前和未来的地理分布情况，可为旨在治疗和逆转脆弱状况的政策、资源配置和规划举措提供重要依据。脆弱状况与不良健康结果相关，包括残疾和死亡。它还表现为医疗保健使用量和费用增加。了解脆弱状况的分布和增长情况对于规划和预算服务提供以及旨在满足澳大利亚不断增长的老龄化人口需求的健康干预措施非常重要。本研究的目的是提供澳大利亚当前和未来脆弱和轻度脆弱人群的基线映射和区域人口估计。
应用地理空间模型对全国脆弱性流行率进行分析，以提供澳大利亚脆弱和轻度脆弱人群的规模、分布和潜在增长估计。
据估计，2016 年澳大利亚约有 415,769 名 65 岁或以上的老年人处于脆弱状态，近 170 万人处于轻度脆弱状态。在未来几年，随着人口老龄化，这些数字将迅速增加，如果按照目前的水平继续流行，到 2027 年，脆弱人数将达到 609,306 人，轻度脆弱人数将达到 2,248,977 人。预计增长的地理分布并不均匀，虽然最大的脆弱人群仍将集中在主要城市，但在远郊、区域和偏远地区的增长速度最快。
通过在这些地区实施健康干预措施并改善获得支持服务的机会，可能会减少远郊、区域和偏远地区脆弱人群的预期增长。脆弱是一种可以通过干预来改变的动态状况。减少脆弱状况将为澳大利亚老年人带来福利，除了降低医疗保健成本外。
