Transforming Health Systems for Integrated Care of Older Populations Globally (Full Transcript)

Speaker 1: The world has committed to global goals for sustainable development that are relevant to everyone, everywhere. Part of this promise is that people of all ages get the health and social care they need. But health systems around the world are not yet ready for older populations. Older people often experience more than one health condition at the same time, and these problems tend to be ongoing. Yet, health systems are usually designed to detect and treat individual diseases and conditions. As a result, they tend to manage older people's health issues in fragmented ways, which have negative consequences. For example, older people often struggle with conflicting advice from different health providers. They may be prescribed many drugs that can have negative interactions. They also might pay higher costs for all the different services. Frequently, this fragmentation means that we miss opportunities to manage chronic conditions and prevent people becoming care-dependent. But we know how health systems can better meet the needs of older populations. Health systems need to shift from managing each disease or condition separately and take a more holistic and integrated approach focused on building and maintaining older people's physical and mental capacity. The starting point for integrated health services is an assessment of the older person's goals, their capacity, and their physical and social environments. This assessment enables health and social care professionals, together with the older person and their caregivers, to develop a care plan where services are coordinated across different providers and settings and delivered in the older person's home or as near as possible. Ensuring universal access to integrated care will offer quality health services and make better use of existing health resources. Most importantly, older people will not be left behind. www.cdc.gov