This study aims to identify the factors affecting the quality of life of the elderly with chronic diseases between a group of those in a city and a group of those in a rural community, focusing on a comparative study of the impacts of their health-rel...
This study aims to identify the factors affecting the quality of life of the elderly with chronic diseases between a group of those in a city and a group of those in a rural community, focusing on a comparative study of the impacts of their health-related characteristics according to their residence, a city or rural community and to propose measures for the quality of their life. This study has significance in that it investigated the impacts of physical condition, health promotion behaviors and subjective expectation of the elderly with chronic diseases on the quality of their life and to investigate the differences between the city and rural community.
Based on the data of the 5th Korean Longitudinal Study of Ageing (KLoSA) conducted by Korea Labor Institute in 2014, this study selected 1,898 people over 65 years old, who had at least one chronic disease as the subjects of an analysis and classified them into 1,371 urban elderly and 527 rural elderly according to their residence. For an analysis of the data, SPSS 22.0 was used, and technical statistics, t-test and multiple regression analysis were conducted.
The main results of this study are summarized as follows:
First, in the result of an examination of the subjects’ sociodemographic characteristics, by sex, women showed a high rate in both groups, while by age, those over 74 showed a high rate in both groups. For the level of education, most of those in both groups had a level lower than elementary school graduation, so it turned out that they had an overall low level of education, and for economic activity, the response that they did not do the economic activity showed a high rate in both groups. The rate of the response that they did not have a religion was higher in the rural community group, while for the gross household income, most respondents earned less than 10 million won a year in both groups.
Second, in the result of an analysis of the difference in the key variables between the groups, the quality of life was higher in the elderly with chronic diseases in the rural community than in those in the city, and there was a significant difference. To compare the physical condition, those in the urban community had more chronic diseases than those in the rural community did. In addition, health promotion behaviors were higher in those in the urban community than in those in the rural community, and there was a significant difference. To examine subjective expectations, both expectation for national health insurance and expectation of long-term care for the elderly were higher in those in the rural community, and there was a significant difference.
Third, according to the result of a multiple regression analysis, the factors affecting the quality of life differed depending on the group. First, it turned out that in the urban elderly with chronic diseases, education level, the presence of a spouse, gross household income, difficulty in daily life due to a chronic disease, depression, subjective physical conditions, health promotion behaviors and expectation for the national long-term care insurance affected their satisfaction with the quality of life. In other words, as they had a higher education level; a spouse; a higher gross household income; less difficulty in daily life due to a chronic disease; lower depression; higher subjective physical conditions, higher health promotion behaviors and higher expectation for the national long-term care insurance, the quality of their life was higher. In contrast, it turned out that in the rural elderly with chronic diseases, the presence of a spouse, gross household income, the number of chronic diseases, depression and subjective physical conditions affected the quality of their life. In other words, as they had a spouse, higher gross household income, fewer chronic diseases, lower depression and higher subjective physical condition, the quality of their life was higher.