A woman listed by the welfare ministry as 110 years old and the 19th-oldest person in Japan has been missing for more than 40 years, according to officials in Tokyo's Arakawa Ward, where she is registered as a resident.

Her oldest son's wife, who is listed as a resident at the same address as the missing woman, told a ward official Wednesday that the woman had not returned home after going out -- either on a shopping trip or for a walk -- in 1962 or 1963, the officials said Thursday.

The son had searched for her by contacting relatives but did not file a missing person's report with police, citing a "complicated" family situation, the ward officials quoted her daughter-in-law as saying.

After the son died in 1999, whenever the ward office asked about the woman, her daughter-in-law said she was not living with her and was moving between relatives' homes, the officials said.

According to the resident registry, the missing woman is supposed to be sharing a household with her daughter-in-law, who has been taking care of the woman's health insurance payments.