In aging Japan, seniors get elderly caregivers

At 63, Mikiko Kyouren could be mistaken for a resident of Shichimi-Kotobukien, a home for seniors, in Imizu, Toyama prefecture, but she doesn't intend to retire anytime soon.

Instead, Kyouren has found pleasure in taking care of the elderly, whose improved life expectancy and falling birth rates have produced a rapidly aging population in Japan.

The former factory worker began her second career to share the joy and pain of other people's final days.

"I didn't get a chance to take care of my parents. I'm really thankful that I got this opportunity," Kyouren told China Daily.

"I don't consider age as a disadvantage for this job. I feel I can understand what these seniors are going through and spend quality time with them. I just focus on what I can do to make their lives better."

Japan is considered a "super-aged nation", where more than one in five people is 65 years or above.

According to Japan's Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications, the percentage of its population aged 65 and over surpassed 27.7 in 2017, making Japan the nation with highest percentage of the elderly in the world.

By 2040, 44 percent of the country's total households will have people who are 65 years or older, and more importantly, 40 percent of those households will have only one member.

"There are a lot of people on the waiting list of our facility," said Akitoshi Kawaguchi, president of Shichimi-Kotobukien. "But we are not big enough to accept them, we don't have enough beds and people."

According to Kawaguchi, the government stipulation is to have at least one caregiver for every three residents in the senior living house.

"Taking care of three patients at the same time is just not one person's job. We tried our best, and with the help of equipment such as mobility aids and lift chairs," Kawaguchi said, adding: "One caregiver for every two patients has already left us exhausted."

Shichimi-Kotobukien has 90 beds for long-term care and another 30 for short-term care, which means people can stay in the house for as long as 30 days and move out after their treatment. Meanwhile, it can admit 45 people for daycare every day. A team of 60 works in three shifts to make that happen.

"Every minute counts in our work," said Kyouren, adding that the toughest part of her job is feeding the inhabitants.

"It takes 30 to 60 minutes to feed one elderly person because 90 percent of inhabitants living here are Alzheimer's patients." Alzheimer's is a general term for memory loss that is serious enough to interfere with daily life.

"Some people forget they ate right after being fed. They sometimes get cranky if they are not fed again," Kyouren said.

Labor shortage is not unique for Shichimi-Kotobukien, but rather quite common in most of the nation's nursing care facilities.

Data from the Japanese Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare showed that in 2017, there were 13,409 senior living houses across the country. They were divided into three categories depending on the number of doctors, pharmacists and nursing staff in each facility.

The average staff position was one caregiver for every two residents.

A survey conducted by Care Work Foundation, a Tokyo-based elderly care support organization, in 2018 showed that more than 66 percent of senior living homes said they suffer from a staff shortage. A total of 8,782 entities were interviewed for the survey.

"On one hand, it's hard to find the right people as we require people with not only professional skills but also a kind heart," Kawaguchi said. "On the other h and, it's hard to retain caregivers considering their low salaries and long work hours."

To cope with the growing labor shortage, the Japanese government has been encouraging stay-at-home mothers and seniors to reenter the workforce.

In some ways, Kyouren has been a trailblazer. For the past 10 years, she has been taking care of seniors, feeding them and providing them companionship. "Everyone will grow old one day, I think it is important for the elderly to take care of each other, because if we don't, no one else will," Kyouren said.

Incidentally, the average age of caregivers working in a senior living home has crossed 50, according to the Care Work Foundation's 2018 survey.

"It has been proven that encouraging the elderly people to take up jobs in the healthcare sector is a constructive way of countering effects of labor shortage," said Song Lishui, an economics professor at the Meiji Gakuin University in Tokyo.

"It helps ordinary people to lighten their economic burden after they reach the retirement age of 60, because they receive their pensions only when they reach 65," Song added.

wangxu@chinadaily.com.cn

(China Daily Global 06/11/2019 page3)