COVID-19 Pandemic Experiences across the Shelter-Care Continuum in Older Adults

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic’s impact on older adults (55+) living at the mid-point of the shelter-care continuum, in seniors housing (SH) and assisted living (AL), remains largely unexplored. This study compares survey responses of SH and AL residents with those of age peers living in private conventional community-based dwellings (CD) in British Columbia, Canada. Despite more SH/AL residents reporting feelings of isolation and changes to social support access, the pandemic appears to have had a greater negative impact on the routines of CD older adults. AL residents were more likely to engage in advance care planning discussions before and since the COVID-19 outbreak. These data are important for improving response to current and future disasters across the shelter-care continuum, particularly in ways to reduce the psychosocial effects of isolation or routine disruption, and strategies to increase advance care planning engagement.

Keywords:

• Advance care planning
• assisted living residents
• COVID-19 pandemic
• older adults
• self-reported impact
• seniors housing residents

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

This study is part of a larger project (iCAN-ACP) funded by a grant from the Canadian Frailty Network, which is supported by the Government of Canada through the Networks of Centers of Excellence (NCE) program.