What types of activities increase participation in community "salons"?

As part of their national long-term care prevention strategy, Japanese government has promoted "community salons" as a way to encourage social participation among community-dwelling seniors. Previous studies suggested that participation in salon activities can be an effective approach to prevent long-term disability. However, there is wide variation in the types of activities offered through salons. We sought to examine different types of salon-based activities and their relation to participation rates among older populations (age ≥65 years). The association between different types of salon activities (exercise-based, cognitive strengthening, dining, socializing, and hobby/recreational activities) and participation rate per population (cumulative number of participants per registered old population in municipalities) was assessed via Poisson regression model. Ecological data were abstracted from the Annual Report on Preventive Long-Term Care Service maintained by the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare of Japan. Salon activities based on hobby/recreational activities were associated with the highest participation rates among the older population (IRR = 1.0029; p < 0.001), while dining-based activities were associated with lower participation rates (IRR = 0.9955; p = 0.0012). Exercise-based salons were associated with higher participation among both women (IRR = 1.0031; p = 0.002) and men (IRR = 1.0023; p = 0.035). Municipalities where health professionals (as opposed to volunteers) were involved in running community salon programs had significantly higher participation rates (IRR = 1.3601), after adjusting for overall density of community salons, city size and prefecture level fixed effects (p = 0.001).