2017 Volume 66 Issue 2 Pages 113-117
In recent years, the change in national age composition, which caused Japan to become a super-aged society, caused a remarkable shortage of facilities for the elderly. Meanwhile, in order to maintain the quality of life for elderly people who are susceptible to infection and health consequences, it is essential to manage high-quality building envelope structure and air conditioning equipment that support the maintenance of the living environment. The situation surrounding buildings has undergone drastic changes and various restrictions have been imposed on the building and its indoor environment. Regarding the health and hygiene of buildings providing for a large number of users and residents, the Building Sanitation Law (Acton Maintenance of Sanitation in Buildings) has been established to ensure compliance with measurements, the reporting of indoor environments, and management standards. However, it is not applied to facilities for the elderly. There is concern about the lack of awareness and information on building sanitation and facility management, but the actual situation is not clear yet. The authors started a questionnaire survey targeting social welfare institutions in Tokyo from 2012 and, in 2013 conducted a nationwide cross survey with a questionnaire targeting nursing homes to shed lights on the actual indoor environment and actual condition of building facility management and its characteristics.
In 2014, 2015 and 2016, in order to examine regional differences, winter measurements were carried out at a special nursing home for the elderly in a northern area of Japan, and basic information for the clarification and improvement of indoor humidity formation was collected.
In this paper, we summarize the findings, that were observed concerning facility management and the problems of health, sanitation, etc., in facilities, and discuss the findings.
