While having social support can contribute to better health, those in poor health may be limited in their capacity to receive social support. We studied the health factors associated with social support among community-dwelling older adults in Singapore. We used data from the third follow-up interviews (2014–2016) of 16,943 participants of the Singapore Chinese Health Study, a population-based cohort of older Singapore Chinese. Participants were interviewed at a mean age of 73 years (range 61–96 years) using the Duke Social Support Scale (DUSOCS). We first applied ordinary least squares regression to DUSOCS scores and found that those with instrumental limitations, poor self-rated health, cognitive impairment and depression had lower social support scores. We then applied latent class analysis to DUSOCS answer patterns and revealed four groups of older adults based on the source and amount of social support. Among them, compared to the ‘overall supported’ group (17%) with the highest social support scores and broad support from family members and non-family individuals, the ‘family restricted’ (50%) group had the lowest social support scores and only received support from children. Health factors associated with being ‘family restricted’ were instrumental limitations (odds ratio (OR) = 1.33, 95% confidence interval (CI) = 1.19–1.49), poor self-rated health (OR = 1.40, 95% CI = 1.28–1.53), cognitive impairment (OR = 1.19, 95% CI = 1.04–1.37) and depression (OR = 2.50, 95% CI = 2.22–2.82). We found that while older adults in poor health have lower social support scores, they were more likely to receive a lot of support from children. Our results showed that lower social support scores among Singaporean older adults in poor health may not indicate lack of social support, but rather that social support is restricted in scope and intensified around children. These results may apply to other Asian societies where family plays a central role in elder-care.

虽然获得社会支持可以有助于改善健康状况，但身体不好的人获得社会支持的能力可能受到限制。我们研究了新加坡社区居民中老年人与社会支持相关的健康因素。我们使用了来自新加坡华人健康研究的第三次随访访谈（2014-2016年）中的数据，该访谈对16,943名参与者进行了研究。使用杜克社会支持量表（DUSOCS）对参与者进行了平均年龄73岁（61-96岁）的访谈。我们首先将普通最小二乘回归应用于DUSOCS评分，发现那些工具受限，自我评估的健康状况差，认知障碍和抑郁的人的社会支持评分较低。然后，我们将潜在类别分析应用于DUSOCS回答模式，并根据社会支持的来源和数量揭示了四组老年人。其中，与“总体支持”组（17％）的社会支持分数最高，家庭成员和非家庭成员的广泛支持相比，“家庭受限”（50％）组的社会支持分数最低，而仅得到儿童的支持。与“家庭受限”相关的健康因素是仪器限制（优势比（OR）= 1.33，95％置信区间（CI）= 1.19-1.49），不良的自我评估健康状况（OR = 1.40、95％CI = 1.28– 1.53），认知障碍（OR = 1.19，95％CI = 1.04–1.37）和抑郁症（OR = 2.50，95％CI = 2.22–2.82）。我们发现，虽然身体不好的老年人的社会支持得分较低，他们更有可能从孩子那里得到很多支持。我们的结果表明，健康状况较差的新加坡老年人中较低的社会支持分数可能并不表示缺乏社会支持，而是社会支持的范围受到限制，并且围绕儿童而加剧。这些结果可能适用于其他家庭在老年人护理中发挥核心作用的亚洲社会。