Visiting service set up for elderly

Shovelling silt for earthquake-hit residents has helped shape a new enterprise to combat social isolation among the elderly.

Student Volunteer Army founder Sam Johnson and Dr Tyler Brummer launched elderly visiting service WeVisit on Friday, to replicate the social interactions that took place in the aftermath of the Canterbury earthquakes some five years ago.

‘‘The thing we see, both here and overseas, is it’s not about the shovelling of the silt or waste.

It’s about the social connection . . . it doesn’t even matter about the silt, what mattered was that a whole lot of young people went and connected with someone of a different generation,’’ Johnson said.

The pair’s personal, one-on-one companion service would match elderly residents, who lived alone or in retirement homes, with a younger trained person. Whether pairs were dead-heading roses, sharing scrapbook ideas or changing light bulbs, the focus was on sharing experiences and keeping families in the loop.

‘‘The thing we’re trying to solve is social isolation and social connectedness,’’ Brummer said.

To date, 25 people had been interviewed and 12 trained for positions. They aged from 18 to 35 years-old.

Social isolation was an ongoing issue for society and earlier this year, Age Concern Canterbury told The Press one in 10 elderly New Zealanders could be socially isolated.

‘‘What I love, is that we can fix this problem. It’s absolutely fixable. There are enough people everywhere who want to visit older people, and enough people that need to be visited,’’ Johnson said.

The service was also designed to target youth unemployment.

‘‘We need young people in New Zealand to not just work in bars and supermarkets their whole time. Actually they can learn a lot from working with older people,’’ Johnson said.

The pair would eventually look to expand and hoped to have a network of hundreds of people to call upon.

‘‘We want to create a system that we can transfer anywhere in New Zealand.’’

Brummer acknowledged it was a sad reflection of society that such a service was needed, but ‘‘it was also a function of modern society’’.

PHOTO: JOSEPH JOHNSON/FAIRFAX NZ Iola Davies showing a few of her rose growing techniques to Student Volunteer Army founder Sam Johnson, right, who has teamed up with Dr Tyler Brummer to launch an elderly visiting service called WeVisit.