• Journal of Families and Better Life
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• v.22 no.4
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• pp.1-14
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• 2004

Although the proportion of frail elderly among the elderly population has been rapidly increasing, there is little preparation to provide housing alternatives for them in Korean society. Long-term care facility a housing alternative for frail elderly that enables them to receive social and medical care services that enhance the quality of their life. This research was conducted to study the opinions of middle-aged Koreans about long-term care facilities for the frail elderly. This study provides useful suggestions for the development of user-paid long-term care facilities in the near future. A survey questionnaire was administered to 600 adults in their 50s to collect data. The sample was stratified according to region, gender, and housing structure type. The results showed that most of the respondents were aware of long-term care facilities for the frail elderly; but they were relatively unwilling to live in these facilities, as compared to other housing alternatives. However, a larger number of respondents said that as they became very frail, they would be willing to live in these facilities. The respondents expressed a high level of need for user-paid long-term care facilities as an alternative to hospitalization. Also, they wanted to have a variety of long-term care facilities that are designed for different levels of disability. The education level of respondents and their spouses, average monthly income, subjective economic level, and religion were major variables that differentiated significantly the opinions about long-term care facilities for the frail elderly.

• Physical Therapy Korea
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• v.24 no.3
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• pp.47-56
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• 2017

Background: Given the potential benefits of wellness programs promoting physical activity of the community-dwelling frail elderly, it is recommended that comprehensive wellness programs combined with the component of physical activity. This may improve overall health and potentially lower the health care cost of the frail elderly. In general, the frail elderly residing in community or those after being discharged from hospitals are often committed to enhancing the status of participation in physical activity. Objects: The purposes of this study were to identify specific shortcomings of current wellness programs as part of continuum of community rehabilitation services and to propose alternatives for the care of the community-dwelling frail elderly. Through this study, geriatric health care professionals may be able to implement assessments and programs to successfully promote an effective continuum of care for the frail elderly. Methods: Article reviews were summarized and evaluated. Results: A model elaborating the relationship between components of successful wellness program and participation in physical activities for the community-dwelling frail elderly are recommended. First, periodic monitoring the levels of physical activity by the use of online measurement system should be considered. Second, individualized adaptive technologies for selecting optimal physical activities for the elderly may be better fit to individuals' current status of physical activity. Conclusion: The current status of physical activity in community-dwelling frail elderly can be monitored by online assessment systems. Through the innovative measurement system, elderly may assess his/her physical activity status overtime, select optimal physical activities matching the status, and create the elderly's own adaptive wellness programs that match to the status while residing in his/her community.

• Research in Community and Public Health Nursing
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• v.21 no.1
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• pp.12-20
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• 2010

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to identify the predictors of health-related quality of life and to examine their effects in frail elderly. Methods: This was a correlation study. The subjects were 680 frail elders aged over 65 who were receiving home care from one of 253 public health centers in 16 provinces, and data were collected from the 1st to 30th of April, 2008. Results: The mean health-related quality of life in the subjects was $6.0{\pm}2.0$. The predictors identified in this study significantly explained 41.3% of health-related quality of life. Self-rated health was the most significant predictor of health-related quality of life. ADL and depression had an effect on health-related quality of life. Conclusion: Self-rated health, ADL and depression were the predictors of health-related quality of life in the frail elderly.

• Journal of the Korean Home Economics Association
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• v.39 no.1
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• pp.81-90
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• 2001

This study focuses on the type of elder care arrangements and its consequences for mental health among physically frail elderly. Based on data from 410 frail older people, this study reveals the following results: (1) Frail elderly in family caregiving situation shows better mental health in terms of depression and psychological well-being than those in self-care or public institutional situation, (2) but this positive effect of family caregiving on mental health, especially depression, among older people is partly explained by the differences in income and marital status among older people in different caregiving situations, (3) the factors which are significantly related to mental health of older people are income in family caregiving situation, and education in both self-care situation and institutional situation. The results of the study emphasize the importance of family resources in family caregiving situation and of personal resources in self7are or institutional situation.

• Research in Community and Public Health Nursing
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• v.23 no.1
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• pp.91-101
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• 2012

Purpose: This study was conducted to examine the effects of exercise on physiological, physical and psychological functions of the frail elderly. Methods: The research design was a nonequivalent control group pretest-posttest design. Data were collected from September 9 to October 10, 2009. The subjects were 56 frail elders who agreed to participate in this study and each subject was randomly assigned to either the experimental group (n=28) or the control group (n=28). The exercise program was provided to each subject in the experimental group twice in a week for 6 weeks. Data were analyzed with frequency, ${\chi}^2$-test, Kolmogorov-Smirnor test and independent t-test using SPSS/WIN 12.0. Results: There was a significant improvement in psychological functions in the experimental group compared to the control group (t=1.726, p=.045). Conclusion: The exercise program showed the effects to improve the psychological functions of the frail elderly with chronic disease. In recommendation, this exercise program could be utilized as a health promoting program for the frail elderly.

• Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society
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• v.20 no.5
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• pp.394-405
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• 2019

The purpose of this study is to clarify the concept of the frail elderly and to obtain theoretical evidence. The research method was conducted using the basic principles for conceptual analysis of Walker and Avant(2005). As a Result of a review of the literature about how to utilize the concept of a frail elderly, frail elderly might be in the intermediate state of health and disease. They can be defined as physically vulnerable in the sarcopenia, inflammation, insulin resistance, and preceding advanced disease, lead to hospitalization, falls, disability, and death. The attributes were physiological, psychological, and socio-environmental and economic factors, so they had multidimensional factors. They were required the assist daily living of another person. Also, their attributes had decreased the amount of recovery time and degree, and exhaustion. The attributes of frail elderly consisted of these facts: dynamic process, multidimensional factors, dependency, vulnerability. The frail elderly was a dynamic process that involves the possibility of change to health and disease, and include physical, mental, cognitive, and social environmental factors. In addition, the frail elderly was difficulty in daily life, physical vulnerability and difficulty in adaption. In conclusion, frail elderly as defined by the results of this study will contribute to the foundation of health care systems, including community visiting nursing to understand the level of frail elderly and systemic management to do not go into long term care.

• Therapeutic Science for Rehabilitation
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• v.10 no.3
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• pp.43-56
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• 2021

Objective : The objective of this study was to present the components of frailty by organizing the definitions of frail elderly and analyzing the tools used to screen them. Methods : This study searched for articles at involved frailty screening assessments in the elderly. Databases including CINAHL, Embase, Medline Complete, and PubMed were searched. The search terms were "assess" AND "frailty" AND "screening" AND ("frail elderly" OR "elderly"). Results : A total of 539 articles were identified by the search and 11 articles were selected. Frailty occurs due to the depressed function of multidimensional factors, and a frail elderly person is defined as one at high risk of health degeneration, functional impairment, and occurrence of disability, and having a high level of threat to life. Seven tools were selected from 11 articles. The most frequently used tool was the frailty phenotype, which was used in five articles (45.4%). The identified components of frailty were physical, activity participation, nutrition, psychological, social, overall health, and age. Conclusion : The results confirmed the definition and components of frailty. This study is expected to contribute to the future development of standardized evaluation tools for screening frail elderly individuals and intervention programs for the management of the frail elderly.

• Research in Community and Public Health Nursing
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• v.27 no.1
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• pp.51-59
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• 2016

Purpose: The purpose of this study is to provide a disease management, nutrition education, and group exercise program for three months to the moderately frail elderly whose physical functions have deteriorated, and to investigate its effects in order to develop an intervention program. Methods: As a quasi-experiment, this study was conducted based on non-equivalence studies designed as a similar experiment. The milk intake group and calcium intake group participated in the disease education, individual nutrition education, and group exercise program for three months, and the control group was visited once in the three months by a nurse who provided disease education, nutrition education, and oral instruction of exercise, and asked them to exercise on their own every day. For the data analysis, ${\chi}^2$-test, ANOVA and $Scheff{\acute{e}}$ test were used. Results: After three months of intervention, there was a significant difference in the frailty level (p=.029) and bone density (p=.001) between the groups. Conclusion: The comprehensive intervention program had an effect on the bone density and the frailty level of the socially-vulnerable and moderately frail elderly, suggesting that the program can be used as a nursing intervention to prevent functional deterioration and damage of the moderately frail elderly.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Physical Medicine
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• v.8 no.1
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• pp.91-98
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• 2013

PURPOSE: The purpose of this study was to investigate characteristics of the effects of a video strength exercise on grip strength, balance, timed up and go in the frail elderly women. METHODS: Subjects were thirty frail elderly people selected by the screening tool and they were divided into exercise group and control group. The video strength exercise was carried out for three time a week for 12 weeks. Data was analyzed with independent t-test between exercise and control group and paired t-test between before and after. RESULTS: There were not significant differences between exercise and control group. However, there were significant effects between before and after in exercise group. The grip strength and one-leg stand with eyes open were significant improved and timed up and go was significant decreases. CONCLUSION: These results indicate that the video strength exercise for the frail elderly was very effective on improving grip strength and one-leg stand and timed up and go.

• The Korean Journal of Rehabilitation Nursing
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• v.18 no.2
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• pp.153-164
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• 2015

Purpose: This study was conducted to develop a community capacity builded exercise maintenance program for frail elderly women. Methods: As a guideline to develop the exercise maintenance program, the intervention mapping framework, including needs assessment, setting program goals, selecting theory-informed intervention methods, producing program components, planning program implementation and evaluation, was used. Focus group interviews with public health nurses and frail elderly women were conducted for needs assessment. Intervention strategies and components were formulated based on community capacity theory. Results: The developed exercise maintenance program consisted of strategies focusing on leadership development, partnership construction, organization development, community systematization of dimension of community capacity. A exercise maintenance program using health leader, health contract, exercise pocketbook, rhythmic activity suiting song and self-help group was included. Conclusion: The intervention mapping method was found to be useful to develop theory-based valid and community capacity builded exercise maintenance strategies for frail elderly women.