Between biographical incorporation of diabetes and waiver of elder’s care

a complex accommodation for diabetics affiliated to the Adjamé anti diabetic center (Côte d’Ivoire)

Abstract

Aging results in the occurrence of diseases like hearing loss, cataracts and refractive errors, lumbago and neck pain, osteoarthritis, depression, dementia, diabetes. However, the non-compliance with therapeutic recommendations by elderly diabetic patients at home is noted. This observation raises the question of the renunciation of care by elderly diabetic patients in the therapeutic relationship. Twenty-eigth elderly volunteers people (7 women and 11 men), aged over 60, have been interviewed were carried out to understand the logic of renouncing the care offered to diabetics. Thus the schemes of social representation of healthcare offer; experiences of giving up alternative care practices were questioned. Insulin therapy and diet are seen as both essential and restrictive (physical, financial, relational and psychological exhaustion). Moreover, the weak alternative of solidarity in the face of the lack of financial means for elderly diabetics, the pluralization of care routes and the fluctuation of the patient's identity from one social context to another, have made it possible to understand that the lack of coverage insurance, the refusal to integrate the social sciences from below and the absence of an integrative policy for therapeutic education sheds light on the recurrence of the phenomenon of renunciation.