| |
Centre for Policy on Ageing | |
 | |
|
Older people in Sweden with various degrees of present quality of life
— their health, social support, everyday activities and sense of coherence | | Author(s) | Gunilla Borglin, Ulf Jakobsson, Anna-Karin Edberg |
| Journal title | Health & Social Care in the Community, vol 14, no 2, March 2006 |
| Pages | pp 136-146 |
| Source | www.blackwellpublishing.com/hsc |
| Keywords | Ill health ; Quality of life ; Social surveys ; Sweden. |
| Annotation | Public health policies in most European countries are concerned with how to keep older people living independently with a qualitatively good life in the community as long as possible. This 2001 postal questionnaire study investigated the characteristics of a population-based sample of 600 people aged 75+ in southern Sweden reporting various degrees of quality of life (QoL) with respect to QoL in different areas. A two-step cluster analysis was performed (n=385, mean age 84.6, SD=5.7) with "present QoL" as clustering attribute. Three groups were disclosed, of which 33.8% could be being regarded as being at risk of low QoL. Those with low present QoL (18.4%) were the oldest and most vulnerable: most were women with "poor or bad" self-rated health, high frequencies of health problems, low total QoL, low social support and sense of coherence, and less physically active. Those with high present QoL (47.8%) reported "more excellent or good" self-rated health, physical activity, satisfactory social support, and higher sense of coherence and total QoL than the other two groups. Those with intermediate present QoL (33.8%) had more of "poor or bad" self-rated health, more health problems, were less physically active, had lower total QoL and sense of coherence, and less social support than those with high present QoL. The sample seemed to reflect the ageing process, in that respondents were at different stages of ageing. However, the fact that the level of social support, sense of coherence and self-rated health followed the same curve as QoL may indicate that some are more vulnerable to low present QoL given the same health, and these should be targeted in preventive programmes since they report low QoL. (RH). |
| Accession Number | CPA-060424203 A |
| Classmark | CH: F:59: 3F: 76P |
Data © Centre for Policy on Ageing |
|
| ...from the Ageinfo database published by Centre for Policy on Ageing. |
| |
|