Total: 413 good practice(s). Download
Telehealth communications and monitoring, implemented by Australian national and local governments, provides patients with consultations through video or telephone instead of face-to-face. This initiative can be used in three ways: remote patient monitoring, store-and-forward and consultations. Between the 13th of March and 31st of July 2022, 118.2 million telehealth services were delivered to 18 million patients.
All Medicare‑eligible Australians—including those in rural, remote, regional areas, and the broader population—benefited. Access expanded to GPs, specialists, allied health professionals, nurse practitioners, midwives, and more.
The programme enabled 16.1 million patients to access over 86.3 million telehealth services, delivered by more than 89,000 providers, with total Medicare rebates of $4.4 billion.
Between March and May 2020, in response to COVID‑19, the government rapidly introduced 281 new MBS telehealth items; later, these were extended and formalized into permanent services following audit, stakeholder consultation, and phased policy integration.
It transformed 10 years of healthcare reform into just 10 days, dramatically improving nationwide access to care via telehealth, and enduring through permanence due to its proven scale, equity, and effectiveness.
The Ready Senior project is a platform that integrates lifelong learning, marketplace and job matching. The project is based on the concept "Want to Learn, Want to Earn, Want to Work" and aims to help prepare seniors to be self-reliant in their health and income. The Want to Learn section offers four technology courses that cover 18 topics, aiming to help seniors learn digital skills and how to use technology to create a business. Additionally, there are five health courses covering 43 topics in order to help seniors learn how to take care of themselves and others and how they can use this for a career. The programmeme takes place on different platforms such as Facebook, YouTube, a website, and LINE. The Want to Earn section has a marketplace and job board, aiming to provide a trading space between members and the public, and trains seniors in content creation and marketing.
People aged 50+
The Ready Senior project has over 16,000 people following the page as of July 2022, and over 4,000 seniors have participated in the online programmes for Want to Learn. Over 200 seniors have received jobs in areas such as data management, consulting, or volunteer work and many have created online pages for their own businesses.
The Ready Senior project is a response to the fact that Thailand has a very large informal economy, and many seniors are working within this economy. Around half of Thai older people do not have savings to support themselves. This project aimed to empower elderly Thais to learn and work, hopefully lessening the stress on the country's health and long-term care systems. This programme was developed in consultation with Japanese experts.
This project s a good practice as it moves away from seeing seniors as passive recipients of care, rather treating them as productive and self-reliant members of the economy. It treats ageing as a transition to a new life stage rather than a decline, and provides elderly with the tools to support themselves.
The Act on the Prevention of Elder Abuse and Support for Caregivers (Act No. 124 of 2005) establishes a comprehensive framework to prevent elder abuse, protect elderly victims, and support caregivers. It defines elder abuse—including physical, psychological, sexual, financial abuse, and neglect—whether committed by caregivers or care‑facility staff. Municipalities must provide consultation, guidance, and immediate protective measures, including safety checks, temporary placement, and coordinated responses with designated support personnel. Mandatory reporting applies when an elderly person’s life or physical safety is at risk, and confidentiality protections ensure reporters are not identified. Municipalities may enter homes for investigation and request police assistance. The Act also requires support and burden‑reduction services for caregivers, establishment of inter‑agency cooperation systems, and staff training in facilities to prevent abuse. Prefectures must publish annual data on abuse cases. Additional provisions address prevention of financial exploitation, promotion of adult guardianship, and penalties for breaching confidentiality or obstructing investigations.
Older persons, particularly those at risk of abuse
Since the Act came into force in 2006, the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare (MHLW) has collected and published nationwide data every year on elder‑abuse reports, characteristics of cases, and municipal responses.
Japan’s elder‑abuse prevention law is good practice because it provides clear definitions of all forms of abuse and mandates rapid municipal action to protect victims. It requires immediate reporting when an elderly person’s safety is at risk and protects reporters’ identities. Municipalities must ensure safety checks, temporary protection, investigations, and coordinated multi‑agency responses. The Act also supports caregivers through counseling, advice, and burden‑reduction measures, recognizing caregiver stress as a risk factor. It strengthens oversight of care facilities, mandates staff training, protects whistleblowers, addresses financial exploitation, promotes adult guardianship, and ensures cooperation across government and community organizations.
TRENDS IN NATIONWIDE RESEARCH OUTCOMES ON ELDER ABUSE AND POLICY DEVELOPMENT TO PREVENT ELDER ABUSE IN JAPAN | Innovation in Aging | Oxford Academic
A national grant programme that implements the Better Later Life strategy at a local level and provides funding for two areas. The first is age-friendly planning, conducting community needs assessments and developing formal age-friendly plans. For example, ensuring local infrastructures are age-friendly by consulting with elderly residents. The second area is funding age-friendly initiatives such as community-led projects to address social gaps, intergenerational programmes and digital inclusion workshops for ethnic groups. There are also social connection events to target loneliness in rural areas. The fund offers small grants from NZD $5,000 to $15,000, enabling local councils and small NGO's to bypass any barriers they may encounter in terms of budget to improve the livelihood of older persons in their area.
pplicants are the main beneficiaries: local councils, community groups, NGOs. The local elderly population are the ultimate beneficiaries, as they benefit from infrastructure improvements and any events created.
Across 2018 and 2023, there were 65 small-scale grants implemented across New Zealand, many local councils have moved from having no senior strategy to having integrated age-friendly plans.
The project was developed using the WHO Eight Domains of Age-Friendliness as a guideline to align with the WHO global standards, as well as local elderly needs.
This programme empowers local communities to solve issues with low cost intervention. It builds a partnership between local councils and the community, creating events and projects that are culturally relevant and specifically address the issues that arise for the elderly in each community.
2025-Age-friendly-Fund-Guidance.pdf
The All-Russian Selection of best practices for older persons, organized by the ANO ’National Priorities’, is a competetition aimed at selecting, developing and spreading the concept of active longevity across the Russian Federation. The project promotes best practices in five areas, including: health lifestyle, active life, education and employment, medical and social care and practice for men aged 60+. It enocurages older persons to lead healthy lives, engage in society through volunteering, pursue further education and employment and recieve the necessary medical and social support.
Beneficiaries included older adults across Russia, as the contest recognized and promoted community-led initiatives enhancing active ageing—particularly those addressing culture, health, education, employment, volunteering, and social care.
As of 2024, over 3.5 million older Russians and around 190,000 silver volunteers were engaged in active ageing programmes across multiple areas of society.
Organized by ANO “National Priorities” with support from the Ministry of Labour and Social Protection, the contest solicited submissions via Smarteka, evaluated them by a panel, and awarded funding, recognition, and dissemination support to winning practices for regional replication.
It systematically identifies, validates, and scales community-driven active ageing initiatives, rewarding innovation while embedding older adults as contributors to social development and policy.
The Bright Life Foundation implements a comprehensive assistance programme for older people that combines material, social, and emotional support. The programme provides regular food packages, medicines, accompaniment to medical appointments, assistance with everyday needs, and the distribution of gift sets for holidays. In addition, the organisation conducts social and cultural activities and mobilises volunteers to provide personal attention and companionship. The programme also extends to institutional settings, where the fund supports and organizes activities in residential care facilities for older persons.
The primary beneficiaries are older people, especially lonely pensioners living independently who experience difficulties meeting basic needs or accessing services. The fund also supports older persons living in residential institutions for the elderly, including homes for older persons under its care.
The fund supports approximately 250 older people living independently and 420 residents in three residential care institutions. Beneficiaries receive regular food assistance, medicines, and practical support, along with social interaction and participation in organized activities.
The initiative was developed as part of the foundation’s long‑term charitable work and relies on a combination of donations, volunteer engagement, and partnerships with care institutions. Implementation involves identifying beneficiaries in need, organizing logistics for food, medicine, and accompaniment, and coordinating volunteers to ensure timely and consistent support. The programme also integrates storytelling and regular communication to maintain public engagement and transparency.
The integrated approach supports not only physical wellbeing but also dignity and social inclusion in older age. It addresses both material needs and social isolation, combines home-based and institutional support, and highlights the human stories of older persons to sustain empathy and accountability.
The Community Network for Services in Singapore, implemented by the Government and Agency for Integrated Care (AIC), aims to promote active ageing, provide befriending services for seniors living alone and integrate health and social support for seniors in need. Correspondingly, this network unites stakeholders to support older persons, for instance, health systems, voluntary welfare organizatons and grassroot organizations.
Socially isolated and low-income seniors aged 60+, especially those living alone in public rental housing without caregiver support.
The programme supports over 2,500 vulnerable seniors through Care Close to Home (C2H) befriending and assisted-living services, enabling them to age in place with stronger social connection, reduced isolation, and improved functional independence.
The Ministry of Health assumed responsibility for aged care planning from the Ministry of Social and Family Development in 2018. It piloted integrated care models like C2H in rental blocks, deploying care teams, training volunteers, and working with Senior Activity Centres (SACs) to offer home visits, social engagement, and coordinated services.
It bridges medical and social care gaps, empowers ageing in place, and ensures timely, community-based support tailored to seniors’ needs.
The Elderly School is a community-based programme promoting life-long learning. Seniors meet once a week at a community center or local temple. The course has 4 modules: health, social, economic and environmental. The school is about promoting active ageing, keeping seniors out of the house and engaged socially.
Older persons
A 2025 study found that those who attended the schools have a quality of life scores 10 points above those who do not. Seniors are more active as a result of attending the schools, and this leads to lower hospital visits and healthcare costs. Overall, there are more than 2000 schools nationwide with over 170,000 seniors studying both in person and online.
The government created this programme after finding out that many Thais were suffering from social death, and were therefore lonely and depressed after retirement. This programme uses a self help model, as seniors are helping to run the school. After the success of the pilot, the government created a playbook so all villages in Thailand could start their own school.
This programme combats social isolation, and is a big tool to stopping elderly isolation, a precursor to dementia. As it uses community centers and temples, it is cost effective and cheap to run. Overall happiness and life satisfaction increased in seniors.
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/354846717_Lifelong_Learning_for_Senior_Citizens_in_Thailand
This strategy is designed as a guide to help Nepal tailor their healthcare system specifically to the needs of an ageing population. There were three changes made, the first being creating a special room or wing for elderly over 60 so they are not placed in the general ward. These areas will be fit for elderly with non- slip floors, handrails, an lower beds. Secondly, there will be a second line for seniors in the hospital, they will have one desk that can handle all their needs from appointment making to pharmacy needs. Finally, there is a specialized bank account for the most sick seniors. If an elderly person has 1 of 8 specified diseases, the government will give them up to NPR 200,000 (approx. USD $1,500) in free care. Seniors over 85 get 100% free care.
all citizens of Nepal aged 60 years or over
The Constitution of Nepal, Senior Citizens Act (2006), and various national policies—established obligations for senior citizens’ health and protection, motivating MoHP to draft a dedicated strategy. The MoHP formally decided to develop the Geriatric Health Service Strategy in recognition of the vulnerability and rights of senior citizens, based on evidence of unmet geriatric needs.
This strategy takes already existing facilities and adapting them to the needs of seniors. It puts limiting the financial strain on elderly as a top priority.
The Intergenerational Program for Older Persons and Children, named Intergen, was implemented by the local government in the Philippines to address critical problems of ageing, while allowing transfer of culture across generations. This programme, implemented nationwide, promotes productive and active lifestyles of older persons and helps them share their knowledge and skills to the younger generation, thus creating an intergenerational environment.
Both older persons and children in the community.
The “Apo Ko” storytelling initiative engages seniors in early childhood sessions, fostering empathy, respect, and intergenerational connection while promoting their empowerment and social participation.
The programme follows a structured process, beginning with consultations with Local Government Units and partners to formalise commitments through Memoranda of Understanding. Volunteers are then mobilised to contribute their time and skills, while both implementers and participants receive training to ensure readiness. Services are delivered to foster interaction between older persons and children, and progress is monitored and evaluated against plans and budgets to maintain accountability.
The programme integrates older and younger generations through structured, participatory activities that foster mutual support and knowledge exchange. It tackles ageing issues while promoting inclusive development, following a clear process from social preparation and training to monitoring and evaluation for sustainability. By engaging older persons in all stages—such as through the “Apo Ko...” storytelling initiative—it empowers seniors, honours their contributions, and strengthens intergenerational bonds.
