Helping others was found to provide a boost for the elderly

The study by Community Service Volunteers (CSV) found that pensioners can improve their quality of life and boost their community by volunteering.

The helpers said that voluntary work in health and education projects had improved their health, confidence, sense of purpose and self-development.

The Scottish Parliament is due to debate the report's findings.

The organisation is urging MSPs to back the scheme and use Scotland's growing army of pensioners, which is forecast to number more than a million by 2013, to the country's advantage.

The research was based on interviews by Paisley University with 20 volunteers engaged in CSV's Retired and Senior Volunteers Programme.

�1bn boost

CSV has 80 volunteers of pensionable age working a total of 15,700 hours a year with primary care patients.

Their work is estimated to be worth �1bn annually to the Scottish economy.

Projects include improving literacy in schools, "buddying" mentally ill people and supporting the housebound.

Retired volunteers had even helped relieve the burden on GPs by helping elderly patients in their homes, the study found.

I never sit and wonder what I am going to do today Rhona Pidgeon, 75, Clydebank

A recent ICM poll for CSV found that 27% of older Scots had lost weight since volunteering, while more than half (51%) said their fitness had improved.

One volunteer, Rhona Pidgeon, 75, from Clydebank, said her work telephoning housebound people to check on their welfare "gets me out of the house".

"I never sit and wonder what I am going to do today," she said.