Continuity of relations between local living environments and the elderly moved to a group living

Abstract

“Ageing in place” is becoming a key issue in the ageing society. As such, the location of nursing homes is an important factor in designing suitable facilities for the elderly. It is important for the elderly to maintain their own daily living environments, even if they have to move to group care facilities or nursing homes. However, many facilities for the care-requiring elderly were traditionally built in serene countryside locations. Therefore, to claim that there was significant continuity in the relationships of those facilities’ residents to their environments would have been difficult. In this chapter, we examine the continuity of relationships experienced by residents in a group care facility with the physical and human aspects of their daily living environments. As a case study, we selected a group care facility for the elderly with dementia located in a city in which a majority of residents moved in from surrounding communities in Japan. Then, we conducted on-site observations of the behaviors and remarks of residents when they went out. Observations indicated that some form of continuity of relationships with daily living environments was experienced by some residents. We suggest that there is a correlation between one’s living-hub history and the status of the continuity of one’s relationship with the daily living environment after moving into a group care facility. We then discuss the conditions and significance of this continuity. Our study shows the significance of moving into a facility close to one’s former daily living environment in order to maintain a relationship with it.