Key ideas about unwanted loneliness in older people

Unwanted loneliness is a multifactorial phenomenon that needs to be addressed directly or indirectly, both through prevention and intervention once it is detected. Building community networks and promoting citizen participation in activities organized by local entities, associations, and public bodies are key to comprehensively addressing the problem of loneliness. But understanding and raising awareness about this issue are equally important. It is crucial to work towards greater social awareness and a shift in values within the population. The issue should be approached from a structural perspective, recognizing that, although it affects individuals in different ways, it is a social problem whose solution requires a comprehensive understanding and action plan.

The Guide for Supporting Older Adults with Unwanted Loneliness (San Juan de Dios Solidarity) compiles all the key concepts that can help professional teams understand and identify unwanted loneliness. To summarize the key aspects, this guide presents 16 key ideas for supporting older adults with unwanted loneliness:

1. Unwanted loneliness is a subjective feeling of lack or loss of companionship, produced by the imbalance between the quantity and quality of the social relationships we have and those we want.
2. It is necessary to dismantle existing beliefs about loneliness: it is not an individual phenomenon associated with personal failure or particular circumstances, it is a social problem.
3. Unwanted loneliness is a very prevalent problem in older people , which increases with aging, and is more common in women.
4. Unwanted loneliness affects both psychological health —leading to depression, anxiety, insomnia, and cognitive decline—and physical health —acting as an independent vascular risk factor and increasing mortality. Therefore, it must be addressed comprehensively and in coordination with multiple health, social, and community stakeholders.
5. It is important to incorporate the detection and management of unwanted loneliness into individual action plans.
6. The involvement of the person being cared for must be ensured in the search for strategies and resources to cope with their feeling of unwanted loneliness, respecting their preferences and values.
7. There are different validated scales to measure unwanted loneliness , although the ESTE II is the one recommended for this in this guide, since it includes three factors: loneliness, use of new technologies and subjective feeling caused by loneliness.
8. The value chain needed to eradicate unwanted loneliness is created through several levels: raising awareness among the population, early prevention, case detection, and intervention to reduce the problems triggered.
9. Awareness-raising should be approached from a structural perspective, promoting comprehensive strategies and policies, as well as preventive and destigmatization campaigns.
10. Detecting unwanted loneliness requires that all health, social, local agents, associations and citizens be aware of the situation and get involved in participating in community networks that promote identification, given that it is a situation that is totally invisible.
11. Prevention seeks to act before unwanted loneliness appears or becomes chronic, looking after people who have not yet fallen into this situation, either through their social or individual activation.
12. It is necessary to influence local, regional, and state public policies to raise awareness of the importance of addressing unwanted loneliness and to coordinate all public resources to eradicate it.
13. It is effective to create cross-cutting plans with a community perspective that identify the agents and local networks (neighborhoods, cities) that can support each person.
14. Volunteering promotes citizen participation in building collective solutions to structural problems; it is an excellent way to address unwanted loneliness from a local perspective.
15. Volunteers involved in providing support to those experiencing loneliness must know how to handle the situation in the best possible way, being mindful of respecting diversity and individual needs; therefore, it is necessary to have organizations that know how to provide support in this process.
16. There are numerous initiatives that seek to address unwanted loneliness, driven by public, political, social institutions and third sector entities, at the local, regional, state and international levels.