Abstract
The principal objective of this study was to analyze and conceptualize the socio-psychological burden in utilizing a nursing home for elderly. The subjects were five elderly from a private nursing home located in Seoul and their familial caregivers. An old male and three females were currently staying at the facility, and a female had been discharged already from there. Data were collected through depth interviews, observations and review of records at the facility For analysis, the data were classified by similar contents among significant expressions and factors in common. The subjects' motives to consider admission to the nursing home might be attributed to familial caregivers' burden, a shortage of support, environmental improvement and feeling of helplessness for the case elderly. The concept of burden is including family members' being badly off in living, their weariness, complications among family members, feeling psychological uneasiness, and hospital expenses. The identified image of nursing homes for the elderly in Korea was generally negative at the point of high cost, unreasonable requisites and limitations for admission to the facilities, inferior situations, and especially in that there were few long-term care facilities within the community boundary. From their experience of nursing homes, the interviewees have felt the sentiments of sorry for their old parents, with the thought of being an undutiful, bitterness, and empathy. Additionally, they expressed a sense of anxiety of relative deprivation against the fact that there were no long-term care facilities available for the middle class. On the basis of these, multi-dimensional needs could be identified for the elderly with chronic illnesses.