Viewpoints of Elderly People on Components of Age-Friendly Cities: A Cross Sectional Study

Abstract

Background. The concept of age-friendly cities has been introduced by the World Health Organization (WHO) in an attempt to pay more attention to the elderly. In Iran, this issue is more important due to demographic changes and age conditions. This study aimed to investigate the views of the elderly people living in Tabriz about the indicators of age-friendly cities. Methods. In this cross-sectional descriptive-analytical study, 351 elderly people were selected from six age-friendly centers in Tabriz by simple random sampling method. The data collection tool was the standard questionnaire of the WHO in an age- friendly city. To analyze the data, both descriptive statistics (frequency, frequency percentage, mean, and standard deviation) and analytical statistics (analysis of variance and t-test) were used. Also, the Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) software version 16 was used and significance level was considered as 0.05. Results. Among the four studied indicators, the health component had the highest average (44.57 (11.81)), followed by the components of social respect (38.5 (11.5)), participation in social relations (34.8 (9.12)), and the cultural and recreational index (32.86 (10.54; range 1-100)). We also observed a significant relationship between gender and marriage with cultural and recreational component (P = 0.002). Conclusion. Since none of the four indicators of age-friendly cities in Tabriz were standard, the managers of aging-related organizations should plan to standardize these indicators to achieve the desired conditions.

Keywords

• age-friendly cities
• elderly
• standards