Grant: Planning/Dissemination Grants - IPPH - ICS - Building Healthy Cities - ECI pool

Older adults are a significant and growing part of the population in the City of Toronto, and currently represent about one quarter of the city's population. Recent reports show that a large proportion of older adults living in the City of Toronto struggle with disability and/or poor health, which contributes to poor physical and mental health outcomes (e.g., social isolation). Unfortunately, the delivery of services to meet the health and social care needs of vulnerable older adults (i.e., those living with a disability and/or chronic health condition) is fragmented, which makes navigating the healthcare and social systems challenging. As a result, vulnerable older adults and their families are not always receiving the care or support needed to optimize their health and wellbeing. We are proposing to form a multi-disciplinary team comprised of health care system professionals, representatives from community-based organizations, City of Toronto staff, researchers and other key stakeholders to plan a large-scale approach to make the City of Toronto more age-friendly for vulnerable older adults. This will involve conducting an environmental scan of existing programs, services and policies in place to support the health and social care needs of vulnerable older adults and their families. Doing so will help to identify areas that can be prioritized for research approaches that will provide the necessary knowledge to streamline available resources to improve outcomes for older vulnerable adults and their families living in the City of Toronto.