Aging & Social Change: Ninth Interdisciplinary Conference

Abstract

Bangladesh is experiencing the third stage of epidemiological transition where the proportion of elderly people, not being different were also found suffering more from non-communicable diseases compared to the communicable diseases than before. This shift from communicable to the non-communicable pattern of diseases and causes of death are raising new challenges to the health system of the country to provide appropriate healthcare delivery to the elderly population. The study adopted a quantitative research strategy and cross-sectional research design. Data was collected from Dhaka and Chittagong division on 537 respondents where 150 were from urban and 387 were from rural areas. Findings show that the average number of diseases of the respondents was 3.6 during three months of the survey. Urban elderly people were more morbid than the rural during this time. Most of the elderly people were suffering from diabetes, arthritis, high blood pressure fever, and eye infection 34.6 percent, 33.5 percent, 30.5 percent, 26.3 percent and 25.7 percent respectively. Arthritis, diabetes, respiratory diseases, and skin diseases were higher in urban elderly than the rural. Ear and kidney diseases, fever, and injury were higher among the elderly people who were living in rural than the urban. High blood pressure, chest pain, stroke, and jaundice were higher among male than the female. Cataracts, diabetes, vision problem, and kidney diseases were higher among female than male elderly people. The study also found a significant association between perceived health status and the number of diseases among the elderly population.