Vietnam is among the fastest aging nations in Asia. According to the Ministry of Health, currently Vietnam is home to approximately 16 million residents aged 60 and above, and is rapidly progressing towards the “aged society” status (at least 14% of the population being 65 or older).
Despite this, nursing homes are few and far between, and only 49 of the 62 provinces have hospitals adapted for geriatric care.
A major obstacle to development is the traditional Confucianist belief of “familial piety”, where obedience to one’s elders is held as a supreme value, and younger generations have an implicit responsibility to care for their elders.
But things are changing. Growing urbanisation, falling fertility and birth rates and the emergence of a middle class have shifted traditional beliefs, and more and more seniors and their families are exploring agecare. From nursing homes to home-based caregivers and day centres, the Vietnamese agecare industry is on the verge of a boom.
Leading the charge is Granger Whitelaw. In Ho Chi Minh City in December 2024, he opened Golden Valley Senior Living, a senior daycare centre. Located in Thao Dien, the facility offers activities, physical therapy and community for Vietnamese seniors.
We spoke to Granger on the challenges facing the Vietnamese agecare industry. The following is an excerpt of our conversation.
What drove you to set up Golden Valley Senior Living?
"I think that the need for eldercare in Vietnam has definitely arrived. The population of about 100 million people, about 12-13% are seniors now. There really is no Western-level type of elder care here. The government does support social services and people as they age but they cannot support the level of care that’s needed as a society ages.
And if you look at Southeast Asia, Vietnam has the fastest growing aged population of any of the countries, so we have a great need for it here, and that’s why we’re building here in HCMC first and then across Vietnam."
Is Golden Valley aimed exclusively at Vietnamese retirees, or are you also hoping to accommodate expat retirees/retirement tourists?
"We are targeting Vietnamese retirees, Vietnamese elder and aged community first. We’re not opposed to Overseas Vietnamese who have come back to Vietnam from the US or other places in Europe that they have been for the last 25 to 30 years, we’d definitely support them as well.
However, there are different levels of elder care. Go-gos, slow-gos, and no-gos. Go-gos are elders who can go out and play tennis, they can play pickleball, they can go golfing, they’re active.
Then we have slow-gos. So slow-gos are people who need some assistance. Whether they have ambulatory issues, with walking, their knees, their back, maybe they have sight issues, maybe they have other issues, cardiovascular or high blood pressure, other things that they need medication for daily, that need to be monitored. All the way up to people who do need assistance walking and caring for themselves, but not full assistance.
That’s what we call no-gos. People who need to be in a full-time status of having nurse care, or cognitive care, so Alzheimer’s/dementia patients, that’s a separate type of facility, it’s a standalone. And then all the way through to hospice/palliative care.
So what we’re sitting in right now is a senior care day community center, where seniors can come during the daytime, and they can get full assistance with nurses and staff, but mostly they’re go-gos, and some slow-gos. And we have facilities here for them. We’re really addressing that slow-go and go-go market first."
What adaptations have you had to make to the classic retirement home model to cater to the Vietnamese market?
"Vietnam is a Confucian and Buddhist country. So, you’ll see 3-4 generations living together, and generally you take care of your parents and grand-parents, and they live with you.
The problem with that is that the parents still go to work, the kids/grandchildren still go to school, and they’re left home alone. Even if they have some neighbours that they interact with, it’s not a community.
And what happens is that they get depressed. Depression creeps in, loneliness creeps in, and as soon as that starts happening, they don’t eat as well, they don’t sleep as well, and they decline. They age at a much faster rate, and that is an issue : for longevity, you want to slow the aging process down. As you get older, having community is the number one factor to help reduce aging, because isolation triggers all the physiological and mental issues.
The day center is still misunderstood here. There’s difficulty understanding that you can come to a community center during the daytime, specifically for older people, that they can interact with, that they can get good balanced nutrition and plans, that they can get physiotherapy.
A lot of them have back issues because of the way they live their lives. Knee issues, they can get physical therapy for their balance and strengthening. They get cognitive, because we do a lot of games and activities, and they have a whole community. There’s a lack of awareness that this type of facility is available.
There is some awareness of nursing homes. But there’s a negative perception associated with living in a nursing home, to a degree, because there’s just no outreach. So yes, there is a tremendous amount of education that needs to be done, and I thank you for doing this, because this is the type of thing that needs to happen.
There needs to be messaging that’s going out that explains that it’s okay, and it’s even better to give your parents/grandparents a place that they can go to during the day or living in a community that is going to keep them healthier and happier, and around longer, in a better state of mind and health."
The aging population of Vietnam is predicted to reach about 30% of the total population by 2050, according to the Ministry of Labour, Invalids and Social Affairs. WIll this drive growth for the Vietnamese retirement industry?
"100%. There are people talking about it and looking at it right now. We started this business 2 years ago, doing the research and planning for it.
I’ve talked to a lot of people and many people have said, you know, “What ? What are you going to do ? Why are you going to do that ? They’re not going to understand it here, that’s not something they’re used to in this culture”, and you know, so on and so forth. All the reasons you shouldn’t do it.
And I said “Oh it’s okay, I’m going to do it anyway because I see a real need for it.” It’s not about making money, there is a real need for it. We’re building another facility right now in D3, which will be a larger facility.
Each of our facilities have clinics, nurses on staff, doctors on call. But yes, I think there’s a tremendous amount of expansion that’s going to happen in the retirement business in Vietnam.
There are people trying to look at it right now and trying to do it in small ways, I think that there is a lot of confusion because there are a lot of variables that you have to understand than you would kind of think just at first glance “Oh yeah, i’ll just do it this way. It’s just a hotel for older people.” But it’s just not that easy.
You have to be able to build communities locally that fit the personalities and the cultures of the local people. And you have to be able to build communities for the expats or the Overseas Vietnamese that fit their needs and desires, what they’re used to.
So, it’s much more complex. It’s not a real estate play. It’s a people-centric play, you have to understand the people and how to care for them intimately, otherwise it won’t be successful."
Do you think the daycare model is a way to get the Vietnamese clientele’s foot in the door ? Or is it the long term solution for the Vietnamese retirement industry?
"I think the daycare centers are a very needed part of an overall plan. I think that yes, it’s going to get the “foot in the door”, it’s going to get them to experience what it’s like to be in a senior/elder community. I don’t think it’s its own business, its own offering. In a nursing home setting, I would have a daycare facility. It’s all the same type of activities, just 24 hours a day and more expansive.
I think it is a way to educate the community here in a very non-threatening way, because they can come for a day, they can come for half a day, they can come for a week, they can test it out and see it. And, I tell you, when people come here, they don’t want to leave. And if they come here for a couple of days, they’re like “Wow, I don't want to be at home. I want to be at Golden Valley.”
There’s a lot of reasons for that. I would say the number one reason other than the community we have and the activities we have here is the staff that we have here. Our staff is fabulous. They are very well trained, they’re very caring people.
And they do a great job putting together workshops, and putting together outings, where they can go out to go see an art museum, or to go see a flower garden. So the community, activities and workshops they do are phenomenal. They’re really wonderful people."
Thank you for the interview Granger. We wish you the best of luck!
If you’d like to find out more about Golden Valley Senior Living, you can reach them through their website or Facebook page.