银龄志愿服务：老年健康照护中的“社会处方”

Silver Volunteering Service: A “Social Prescription” for Older Adults’ Healthcare

摘要: 在人口快速老龄化背景下，老年健康风险已延伸至心理社会层面，难以通过传统的专业照护与家庭照护充分回应。本文引入社会处方视角，探讨北京银龄志愿服务对健康照护的促进作用。研究发现，银龄志愿者通过生活协助、陪伴交流和即时响应，重建老年人的社会联结，提供持续情感支持，并增强其健康安全感，有效回应了老年人孤独、抑郁和社会隔离等非医疗健康需求；同时，志愿者自身也获得了社会价值和积极健康效应，形成了难以替代的独特优势。建议将银龄互助视为具有健康促进意义的社会处方实践，完善其与专业服务的转介及支持机制，加强志愿者健康保障与情绪支持，并通过社区照护系统赋能，推动更具温度和可持续性的老年健康照护路径。

Abstract: With the rapid population ageing, health risks among older adults increasingly extend beyond physical conditions to psychosocial challenges that cannot be adequately addressed by conventional professional and family care alone. Drawing on the perspective of social prescribing, this article examines how volunteering by older adults in Beijing contributes to the health and care of older adults they help with. The findings show that older volunteers help rebuild social connections, provide sustained emotional support and enhance older adults’ sense of health security through daily living assistance, companionship, and timely responses to emergencies. In doing so, they address non-medical health needs associated with loneliness, depression and social isolation. At the same time, volunteering also benefits older volunteers’ health and sense of social value, offering irreplaceable advantages beyond formal and family care. This article suggests that recognising mutual support among older adults as a form of social prescribing, strengthening referrals to professional services and support for volunteers’ wellbeing, and empowering community care to promote more compassionate and sustainable care in later life.