MONTEGO BAY, St James — With Jamaica’s ageing population and an increasing demand for caregivers, a new day care centre for the elderly is being touted as a step in the right direction. Located in Albion, St James, it will begin accepting clients on November 4.

“A recent IDB (Inter-American Development Bank) publication estimates that approximately 15 per cent of the Jamaican population is 60 years and older and about seven per cent of this population need help with at least one daily living activity such as eating, bathing or showering,” said director of the Western Jamaica Campus of The University of the West Indies (The UWI) Professor Donovan Campbell.

“What is even more alarming is the fact that the demand for long-term care services will more than triple in the next 30 years, that’s the direction we are heading in to due to population aging and epidemiological transitions,” he continued.

He was speaking during last Thursday’s launch of the facility which is located at what was once called Village of Hope but has since been renamed Livwell.

The St James centre was established through a partnership formed by the Mona Ageing and Wellness Centre at The UWI; the IDB through its IDBLab facility and the Brenda Stafford Foundation, a Canadian-based non-profit organisation that operates Livwell.

The collaboration will also include a three-month study to determine if it can be replicated.

“We have several intake forms that we plan to use to capture useful information and then use that data to drive subsequent efforts because we may be able to bring the model to another parish,” explained Dr Kayon Donaldson-Davis, a representative of the Mona Ageing and Wellness Centre.

She stressed the need to find new ways to care for the aged.

“We are dealing with a situation where our population is getting older and people are living longer and therefore, we have to expand our thinking in terms of what long-term solutions look like,” Dr Donaldson-Davis told the gathering.

“Not everybody will be suited for a nursing home environment…and therefore, we have to be thinking more broadly about what we can do that meaningfully engages older persons and not just to have them sit at home and be bored and be lonely, those things that drive further mental and cognitive decline,” she added.

Dr Donaldson-Davis explained that The UWI-based facility applied to the IDB for support and funding was made available through its community-based Caregiving for Older Adults project. She said the resources were enough for two centres, one based on The UWI campus and a second in another section of the country.

“What we did was to utilise GIS mapping to find the location that has a concentration of older adults and Montego Bay was one of the places identified as having a high concentration of persons 60 years and older,” Dr Donaldson-Davis told the Jamaica Observer.

She said the Brenda Stafford Foundation became a partner after they realised they had mutual interests.

“They run the Livwell facility, which was formerly called the Village of Hope, and they have had that there for several years. That is a long-term care facility, so they are in the business of older adults care and so it is a good collaboration to have,” Dr Donaldson-Davis explained.

“We went in, advised them, provided them with the technical support as to what the facility changes would need to be in order to adapt it for older adults, the little changes that needed to be made, and organised the space and outfitted the space. That was Mona Ageing’s role in this,” she said.

For president and chief executive officer (CEO) of the Brenda Stafford Foundation Tony Weekes, collaboration and partnership are at the core of their organisation’s philosophy.

“This new pilot programme is a testament to what we can achieve when we come together for a shared goal. We will always be able to do more through partnerships than alone,” he said.