The needs for the social welfare services for the elderly in the Cherngtalay sub-district administrative organization (SAO), Thalang district, Phuket province
Abstract:
The purposes of this research were : 1) to study the level of needs for the social welfare services for the elderly of the Cherngthalay SAO, Thalang District, Phuket Province, 2) to compare the level of needs of the elderly of different background, 3) to propose guidelines to improve the provision of welfare for the elderly. The sample group consisted of 295 elders who were residing at Cherngthalay SAO, Thalang District, Phuket Province. Questionnaires were used as tools to collect the data. The statistics employed in analyzing the collected data were frequency, percentage, arithmetic means, S.D., and t-test, F-test, and LSD.
The results of the study revealed :
1. The level of the needs for social welfare for the elderly was found to be high. The most needed aspects were found to be health care, social security and protection, services and support network. The elderly also needed more income, accommodation, and recreation.
2. In comparing the needs of the elderly of different background, it was found that the elderly of different gender, age, income per month had the same level of needs for social welfare. However, the elderly of different religion and level of education had a significant difference in the needs for social welfare at the level of 0.05. The number of Buddhist elderly who needed social welfare was more than the Muslim elderly; the elderly with lower levels of education needed more support than the elderly with higher levels of education.
3. The respondents proposed suggestions to improve the efficiency of the provision of social welfare for the elderly by the Cherngthalay SAO as follows : the Cherngthalay SAO should provide health care services by giving advice about health and health supplies and medication to the elderly. The monthly benefit payment should be increased to 1,000 baht.