Older people are getting healthier

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OLDER people are becoming healthier each year.

A study by the University of Oxford, England, said that older people should not be seen as an extreme burden on the National Health Service (NHS). The study found people born in each year from 1912 were increasingly less likely to need emergency treatment and a 70-year-old now was spending less time in hospital than a 70-year-old five or 10 years ago.

Healthier diets, reductions in smoking, more vaccinations and preventative drugs have all helped to keep people healthier in later life.

The news comes after a charity warned that the NHS was having to fork out millions of pounds every year because of delays in getting elderly patients back into their own homes following a hospital stay.

Charity Age UK said the average patient needing adaptations to their home, such as handrails, was forced to wait in hospital for an extra 27 days while improvements were made allowing them to go home.

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