At CASE, the Centre for Ageing and Supportive Environments at Lund University, the primary focus is on older and ageing people and the environments where they live. How should the outdoor environment, public transport and living quarters be designed to support activity and health in later life?
The new FAS centre is the result of many years’ collaboration between Professor Agneta Ståhl at the Lund Institute of Technology and Professor Susanne Iwarsson at the Faculty of Medicine, Lund University, and their shared interest in older people and their living environments. They will jointly direct the work at CASE. Besides researchers from their own faculties, the Faculty of Social Sciences will also be involved in the endeavour.
“My field is occupational therapy and I’ve worked for instance with home modification for older people and done research on the importance of the home environment for activity and health,” explains Susanne Iwarsson. “Agneta Ståhl has researched accessibility and safety for older people in the outdoor environment and public transport, and over the last ten years we’ve collaborated with each other and with many qualified researchers from other places. For us, CASE is a way to concentrate and develop research in this field.”
“A new issue is to study individuals affected by disease early in life to see what needs they have as they age, for instance with respect to living quarters,” says Susanne Iwarsson. “Another area is to study the importance of the environment for preventing accidental falls, in particular outdoors. There’s also a very urgent need to study what happens when unprotected senior citizens are involved in traffic accidents. If you know what factors are significant for the accidents, it’s easier to work preventatively.”
Within the framework of CASE, the six research groups involved will also be tracking individuals and environments over time.
“A municipality in Skåne has for instance redesigned the outdoor environment in an area to be more supportive for the older inhabitants. We recently made a first follow-up on those measures to see if the older inhabitants have noticed any difference: do they go out more, do they experience fewer accidents? Another project idea is to monitor the conversion of a nursing home to seniors’ residences. We would collect objective data on residential and environmental obstacles, but would also interview the residents about how user friendly their home is and how it affects their quality of life and health.”
For the researchers at CASE, one objective is for half of Sweden’s municipalities to have applied the new research results within ten years.
“It’s about giving different actors in society a basis for creating environments that support active and healthy ageing, where older people can get in and out of their homes, use public transport, and enjoy an environment that enables them to maintain their social networks,” says Susanne Iwarsson.
Text: Sara Bergqvist Månsson
FAS centre funding: SEK5 million annually.
For further information: 
, www.med.lu.se/case
