Humanity in Diversity: A Simple Basic Complementary Act to Help the Marginalized and Lonely Elderly Living in a Private, Non-Profit Nursing Home

Abstract

Aims: To describe a simple basic complementary humanity act such as nursing home visit that can help a group of marginalized and abandoned elderly with no family who live together as residents of a non-profit nursing home feel better with simple but universal human touch and also to maintain or improve the functional status of elderly and reduce the use of institutional care services; an approach that can be consider as an alternative that complement the medical management of the elderly Study Design:  Interventional cross sectional study. Place and Duration of Study: Private non-profit nursing home Yayasan Bunga Bakung, north Jakarta, Indonesia, between November-December 2023. Methodology: 12 individuals (1 man, 11 women; age range 65-85 years) with geriatric syndrome whose previously live alone with no family, no social security, abandoned and marginalized, which are then accommodated and maintained by a non-profit foundation in a nursing home as subject to our visit. Three out of these 12 residents have definite post-stroke condition with weakness or paralysis on one side of their body, and having problems with co-ordination and balance. 7 out of 12 suffer from hypertension. We conducted five simple and basic nursing home visit to maintain and improve the functional status of elderly and minimize the use of institutional care services. In the first two visit, a small advanced team conducted simple focus group discussion (to the management in the first visit, and to the inmates during the second visit) regarding the daily management of the continuity of nursing homes as well as the advantages and disadvantages and future hopes felt by the inmates. The third visit is our main social activity which centered on all the elderly and followed by the fourth and fifth visit where simple observation and analysis of the inmate’s response to the previous visit conducted. Results: Observation conducted during the fourth and fifth showed a slight improvement. This basic risk limitation group intervention) related to the performance of the elderly, such as in the context of topics of conversation among themselves as well as increased personal perceptions regarding feelings of worth, being given attention, being considered present and important. A risk limitation group approach like the one that we did seems promising, but further scientific evidence is needed Conclusion: Non-invasive complementary humanitarian approach for maintaining and even improving functional status of elderly is a possible approach that may produce happiness and well-being, and reduce medical as well as financial burden, hence improving the real time psycho-biological welfare is part of the management of geriatric problem. This approach, however, need further work to validate reliability.