Thematic report Selected health indicators among the elderly: Findings from the SADHS 2016, GHS 2016 and MACoD 2016 Statistics South Africa Risenga Maluleke Report No. 03-00-13 Statistician-General STATISTICS SOUTH AFRICA ii Selected health indicators among the elderly: Findings from the SADHS 2016, GHS 2016 and MACoD 2016 / Statistics South Africa Published by Statistics South Africa, Private Bag X44, Pretoria 0001 © Statistics South Africa, 2019 Users may apply or process this data, provided Statistics South Africa (Stats SA) is acknowledged as the original source of the data; that it is specified that the application and/or analysis is the result of the user's independent processing of the data; and that neither the basic data nor any reprocessed version or application thereof may be sold or offered for sale in any form whatsoever without prior permission from Stats SA. Stats SA Library Cataloguing-in-Publication (CIP) Data Selected health indicators among the elderly: Findings from the SADHS 2016, GHS 2016 and MACoD 2016 / Statistics South Africa. Pretoria: Statistics South Africa, 2019 Report no. 03-00-13 62 pp ISBN 978-0-621-47168-7 A complete set of Stats SA publications is available at Stats SA Library and the following libraries: National Library of South Africa, Pretoria Division National Library of South Africa, Cape Town Division Library of Parliament, Cape Town Bloemfontein Public Library Natal Society Library, Pietermaritzburg Johannesburg Public Library Eastern Cape Library Services, King William’s Town Central Regional Library, Polokwane Central Reference Library, Mbombela Central Reference Collection, Kimberley Central Reference Library, Mmabatho This report is available on the Stats SA website: www.statssa.gov.za For technical enquiries please contact: Rika du Plessis Email: [email protected] Selected health indicators among the elderly: Findings from the SADHS 2016, GHS 2016 and MACoD 2016, Report 03-00-13 STATISTICS SOUTH AFRICA iii Table of contents List of tables .................................................................................................................................................... iv List of figures .................................................................................................................................................. iv List of maps ...................................................................................................................................................... v Preface ............................................................................................................................................................. vi List of acronyms and abbreviations ............................................................................................................ vii 1. Introduction .................................................................................................................................................. 1 1.1 Background .................................................................................................................................................. 1 1.2 Purpose of the report ................................................................................................................................... 3 1.3 Objectives of the report ............................................................................................................................... 4 1.4 Presentation of the report ............................................................................................................................ 4 2. Data sources and methods ......................................................................................................................... 4 2.1 South Africa Demographic and Health Survey, 2016 .................................................................................. 4 2.1.1 Data collection .......................................................................................................................................... 5 2.1.2 Limitations of the SADHS 2016 data ........................................................................................................ 5 2.1.3 Sampling and weighting of SADHS 2016 data ......................................................................................... 6 2.2 General Household Survey, 2016 ............................................................................................................... 6 2.3 Mortality and causes of death, 2016 ............................................................................................................ 7 3. Results .......................................................................................................................................................... 7 3.1 Characteristics of the elderly, SADHS 2016 ................................................................................................ 8 3.2 Characteristics of the elderly, GHS 2016 .................................................................................................. 10 3.3 Nutritional status of the elderly .................................................................................................................. 12 3.3.1 Measured nutritional status .................................................................................................................... 12 3.3.2 Perceived nutritional status .................................................................................................................... 15 3.3.3 Comparison between measured and perceived nutritional status ......................................................... 18 4. Morbidity from high blood pressure (hypertension) .............................................................................. 20 4.1 High blood pressure from SADHS 2016 and GHS 2016 ........................................................................... 20 5. Morbidity from diabetes mellitus ............................................................................................................. 25 5.1 Diabetes mellitus from SADHS 2016......................................................................................................... 25 6. Mortality due to selected non-communicable disease .......................................................................... 30 6.1 Leading underlying natural causes of death by sex for the elderly ........................................................... 30 6.2 Leading underlying natural causes of death by population group ............................................................. 32 6.3 Leading causes of death by province ........................................................................................................ 34 7. Health insurance cover ............................................................................................................................. 36 7.1 Medical insurance cover from the SADHS ................................................................................................ 36 8. Conclusion ................................................................................................................................................. 40 9. References ................................................................................................................................................. 42 Appendix A ..................................................................................................................................................... 44 Appendix B ..................................................................................................................................................... 45 Appendix C ..................................................................................................................................................... 46 Appendix D ..................................................................................................................................................... 47 Selected health indicators among the elderly: Findings from the SADHS 2016, GHS 2016 and MACoD 2016, Report 03-00-13 STATISTICS SOUTH AFRICA iv List of tables Table 1: Background characteristics of the elderly, SADHS 2016 ................................................................. 8 Table 2: Background characteristics of the elderly, GHS 2016 .................................................................... 10 Table 3: Percentage of measured BMI among the elderly by place of residence, population group and province, SADHS 2016 ............................................................................................................ 13 Table 4: Perceived BMI among the elderly by place of residence, population group and province, SADHS 2016 .................................................................................................................................. 17 Table 5: Percentage of elderly reported being diagnosed with high blood pressure by place of residence, population group and province, SADHS 2016 .............................................................. 20 Table 6: Percentage of the elderly diagnosed with high blood pressure by population group and province, GHS 2016 ....................................................................................................................... 22 Table 7: Percentage of the elderly reporting being diagnosed with diabetes mellitus by place of residence, population group and province, SADHS 2016