The Nanping Municipal Elderly Service Institution started operation on Aug 19 and will offer the first batch of 200 nursing beds this year. Residents in need are now able to apply via the hotline +86-756-5512345 or logging on to the Zhuhai "Smart" Elderly Care platform.

The institution is one of Zhuhai's Top 10 Livelihood Projects for 2021, as well as the city's first public welfare senior care complex offering both medical care and health preservation services.

Nanping Municipal Elderly Service Institution [Photo by Cheng Lin / WeChat account: zhuhaifabu]

Located at the intersection of Lianquan and Nanquan roads, the institution is close to Zhuxiandong Park, which adds to its tranquil environment.

Apart from 200 ward beds and 900 nursing beds, the modern institution has facilities including multi-functional rehabilitation zones, reading areas, senior canteens, a medical center, public activity areas, multi-function halls, and cultural entertainment rooms for table tennis, painting and calligraphy, as well as handicrafts.

Of note, its Time Cabin boasts exhibits of historic items like sewing machines, bicycles, radios, kettles, and kerosene lamps, which have positive therapeutic effects on seniors with cognitive disorder by reminding them of their old memories, according to a staff member of the institution. 

Activities like painting and calligraphy exhibitions, galas, as well as chorus and poetry recitations will also be held. 

Intelligent and considerate designs adhering to the special needs of seniors have been applied in the institute's design. Numbers, as well as signs of common fruit and vegetables like eggplants, watermelons, strawberries, and apples are placed near elevator buttons and floor instructions to help seniors with cognitive disorders remember and recognize floor numbers. 

Interior corridors are equipped with double-layer handrails of differing heights to assist those who have difficulties moving or who use wheelchairs. 

Single, twin, triple, quad, and five-people rooms are available, with each room equipped with liftable nursing beds, reading lamps, as well as 24-hour emergency call buttons. Bath chairs are installed in restrooms and handrails are set up near the toilet and wash basins.

Zhuhai People's (Renmin) Hospital will provide professional services to set up a 24-hour health care center with rehabilitation, traditional Chinese medicine, general, laboratory, and imaging medicine departments. Professional doctors and nurses in the center will ensure the basic medical treatment, chronic disease management, rehabilitation nursing, and health education of seniors in the institution, said Zhong Bo, the institution's executive dean. A two-way emergency referral green channel has also been opened.

Wang Guilian, director of the Zhuhai Civil Affairs Bureau, said that the institution is expected to be a national demonstration alliance on senior chronic disease health care, provincial five-star senior care institution, and municipal talent cultivation base for high-caliber talents in senior care in the next three to five years. 

The institution will open more than 600 nursing beds in 2023, said Chen Yitang of the Zhuhai Civil Affairs Bureau, adding that the public welfare nursing beds will first go to seniors who are highly disabled. 

Zhuhai is now moving forward construction of public senior service institution projects at the municipal and district levels to meet seniors' demands in high-quality senior care services.