Long-term services in Mexico: homes for the aged.

Accurate statistics are not available about the number of people in institutions for the aged in Mexico, but the majority are assumed to live with their family or on their own and to be integrated with the community. However, the increase of Mexico's aging population, from its present more than 4 million to 12 million people over 60 years of age in the year 2025, together with the decreased population growth rate (3.5% in the early seventies; approximately 2.5% currently, and 1% in the year 2000) will considerably increase the demand for health care and services for this sector of the population. Nursing Homes should be not only shelters, but should help to raise or maintain the quality for life of elderly people in all areas: physical, psychological, and social. In the near future, it will be necessary not only to build more homes for the aged, but to develop and implement other forms of care that will allow the elderly to remain integrated with the community. Through home care and substitute homes, families that take care of their elderly relatives can be helped; and direct assistance can be give to old people who wish to be independent.