• Journal of the Korean Society of Physical Medicine
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• v.14 no.4
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• pp.29-35
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• 2019

PURPOSE: The aim of this study was to provide the standard value of the Five Times Sit to Stand Test (FTSST) measurement on the daily life independence of the elderly in Korea and examine the effects of this test on their daily lives. METHODS: This study was conducted on elderly people over 65 years of age living in Gyeongsangbuk-do, Korea. FTSST was performed while sitting position on a chair. The subjects were classified into independent and dependent living groups according to their lifestyle, and their influence was then examined through logistic regression analysis. To determine the usefulness and cut-off value of the FTSST, the analysis was performed using the ROC curve. RESULTS: The elderly were more likely to live in a group rather than independently as the FTSST time increased (p<.05) (OR=1.098). The area of the lower part of the ROC curve was .707, and as the FTSST increased, a subject was more likely to live in a group rather than independently (p<.05). The cut-off value was assigned to the point where both the specificity and sensitivity were at the coordinates. The sensitivity and specificity were .626 and .753, respectively at 15.62 seconds. CONCLUSION: The elderly in Korea are more likely to live a group-dependent lifestyle than live independently; the likelihood of this outcome is increased further for every additional second beyond 15.62 seconds. The loss of independence of daily life could be predicted based on the status of a subject's lower leg strength using the FTSST.

• Journal of Oriental Neuropsychiatry
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• v.30 no.2
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• pp.47-58
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• 2019

Objectives: To conduct and report the results of a public health promotion program in Korean medicine (KM), namely the KM Visiting Care Service for Solitary Elderly, from November 2018 to April 2019. Methods: Six elderly people living in a rural area received the KM visiting care service, twice a week, for four months. This service consisted of acupuncture, auriculotherapy, and supportive counseling to manage their musculoskeletal pain, cognitive impairment, and/or depression. The changes of symptoms were assessed using Numeric Rating Scale (NRS), Korean version of Mini-Mental State Examination for Dementia Screening (MMSE-DS), Korean version of Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA-K), and Geriatric Depression Scale-Short form Korean (GDS-SF-K). Results: Through the 4-months KM visiting care service, the overall subjects' NRS-rated pain decreased slightly. Most showed improvement in MMSE-DS and/or MoCA-K, except one subject who was diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease. Depression assessed by GDS-SF-K showed improvement in a few subjects who were unable to walk independently. Satisfaction assessed through survey was generally high in all subjects. Conclusions: This KM Visiting Care Service for Solitary Elderly may help improve the pain and cognitive function of frail solitary elderly in rural areas. However, the protocol need to be improved to optimize the effect.

• Journal of Korean Medical Science
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• v.33 no.51
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• pp.332.1-332.8
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• 2018

Background: The trend of aging society is occurring globally, and with it, one of the health problems that is emerging is frailty. Efforts are being made to account for the increasing prevalence of frailty, and various modifiable factors are being considered in regards to frailty. Because social contact has shown beneficial effects in terms of health in previous studies, it is increasingly being considered in relation to frailty. The purpose of this study was to assess the association of different types of social contact with frailty status. Methods: A total of 1,200 Korean elders aged 70-84 years old were included in the study. Using Fried's Cardiovascular Health Study index to categorize the frailty status, the relationship between frailty status and frequency of contact (i.e., with family members, friends, or neighbors) was analyzed using multinomial logistic regression accounting for confounders. Results: Adjusting for all covariates, frequency of contact with friends was the most statistically significant. Less frequent contact was associated with a significantly higher odds of pre-frailty: monthly (odds ratio [OR], 2.02; 95% confidence interval [CI], 1.27-3.20), and rarely (OR, 1.87; 95% CI, 1.17-2.99), with daily contact group as reference. Also, those contacting friends monthly (OR, 5.04; 95% CI, 2.29-11.08) or rarely (OR, 3.23; 95% CI, 1.58-6.61) were more likely to be frail compared to the daily group. Conclusion: Frequency of social contact, especially with friends, is strongly associated with frailty.

• Journal of the Korean housing association
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• v.18 no.5
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• pp.65-72
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• 2007

What is the meaning of home to older people? How much is home significant for older people? How do they express self-identity through decorating their own homes? These are the new subjects that scholars in the West are involved in lately in terms of micro-perspective (George, 1998; Kellett, Gilroy & Jason, 2005; Gilroy & Kellett, 2006). It is evident that home has more significant meaning to older people than other age groups, since the older are more likely to spend greater time within the home through lower income, lessening mobility or loss of companions (Gilroy, 2005). Also the older tend to cling to their homes and attach to possessions than the younger. Older people's possessions are the things that memories of their lives were absorbed. Therefore, possession display can role as a mean of showing their past lives and memories. Gilroy and her colleagues (2005, 2006) found that there was a certain pattern of possession display in English older people's households, and that older people would like to express self-identity through decorating their own homes with their precious possessions. Then, isn't it interesting to find out if there is any pattern of possession display or decoration items in Korean older people's households as well? Thus, the aim of this study is to describe pattern of possession display as a mean of expressing self-identity in Korean older people's households. Interview with older people was used to find out the way and reason of display possessions. Observation method including taking photos and hand-drawings was also added in order to demonstrate detail condition of display items in the house. Possessions display and furniture arrangement in the living room and bedroom were investigated to find out a certain pattern of display and meaning. Research objects were healthy older people aged over 60, who are living independently from their adult children, and who can manage housekeeping by themselves. 32 households were investigated in the area of Seoul, Kyunggi, Chungchungnam, and Kangwon provinces. The findings demonstrate that most precious possession for Korean older people is photo of themselves; especially one taken in their younger age. The reason of it is because the photo reminds them of their heydays when they were vital. Photo of the most beloved one is displayed more frequently in the bedroom than in the living room indicating consistence with English case. As symmetrical display pattern was dominant in case of English older people's households, no dominant display pattern is found in Korean case. Korean older people also cling to their homes and possessions and want to keep their dwelling space as large as what they use now. It is notable that even after they become older and frail, they want sufficient space to display possessions as a mean of self-identity expression. Attachment to possessions and decoration can give older people significant meaning of identity, and it is the reason why architects or interior designers have to meet older people's needs. It needs consideration that residents are allowed to bring their old furniture and precious possessions when they move in elderly housing unit in order to minimize environmental shock, as well as feeling at home. This subject could suggest a clue to designers or architects who have to meet residents' needs in space design of elderly housing or facilities in the future. Psychological well-being of older people can be met by making them feel at home wherever they live. They need space where they can express their own identity and personality even in case when they have to live in a limited small space like elderly housing unit or nursing home.

• Journal of Family Resource Management and Policy Review
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• v.20 no.3
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• pp.1-23
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• 2016

This study analyzes the effects of caring for grandchildren on Korean grandparents' health, using the Korean Longitudinal Study of Aging from 2006 to 2012. We investigate how caregiving is provided and analyze the effects of caregiving on grandparents' physical health, mental health, and health-related behaviors. As elderly people's health is generally frail, it is unclear whether the provision of childcare affects their health negatively. We control for the endogeneity of caregiving by an individual fixed effect (FE) model and instrumental variable-fixed effect (FE-IV) models. Using these models, we determine the endogeneity of caregiving and show that the significant effects of caregiving on health disappear as we control for endogeneity in the FE and FE-IV models. Even after controlling for endogeneity, we find that caregiving increases the probability of feeling pain as well as the number of different types of pain. Furthermore, caregiving increases the probability of restrictions on daily activities because of pain. On the other hand, caregiving reduces the symptoms of depression. In relation to health-related behaviors, caregiving reduces the probability of physical exercise and regular meals. Our results imply that although caregiving has a positive effect on mental health, the increase in physical pain and in non-healthy behaviors may lead to a deterioration of the caregiver's long-term health, which in turn may increase the medical costs of the elderly. Potential policy alternatives are discussed in the paper.

• Research in Community and Public Health Nursing
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• v.29 no.4
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• pp.429-439
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• 2018

Purpose: The aim of this study is to identify core keyword of frailty research in the past 35 years to understand the structure of knowledge of frailty. Methods: 10,367 frailty articles published between 1981 and April 2016 were retrieved from Web of Science. Keywords from these articles were extracted using Bibexcel and social network analysis was conducted with the occurrence network using NetMiner program. Results: The top five keywords with a high frequency of occurrence include 'disability', 'nursing home', 'sarcopenia', 'exercise', and 'dementia'. Keywords were classified by subheadings of MeSH and the majority of them were included under the healthcare and physical dimensions. The degree centralities of the keywords were arranged in the order of 'long term care' (0.55), 'gait' (0.42), 'physical activity' (0.42), 'quality of life' (0.42), and 'physical performance' (0.38). The betweenness centralities of the keywords were listed in the order of depression' (0.32), 'quality of life' (0.28), 'home care' (0.28), 'geriatric assessment' (0.28), and 'fall' (0.27). The cluster analysis shows that the frailty research field is divided into seven clusters: aging, sarcopenia, inflammation, mortality, frailty index, older people, and physical activity. Conclusion: After reviewing previous research in the 35 years, it has been found that only physical frailty and frailty related to medicine have been emphasized. Further research in psychological, cognitive, social, and environmental frailty is needed to understand frailty in a multifaceted and integrative manner.

• Journal of agricultural medicine and community health
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• v.46 no.1
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• pp.23-31
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• 2021

Objectives: Frailty and sarcopenia are recent important concepts in elder health care. Sarcopenia is the most important factor influencing frailty, and exercise and nutritional status are known to affect sarcopenia. The purpose of this study was to identify the relationship between nutritional status, sarcopenia, and frailty. Methods: This study was a cross-sectional design. The subjects of this study were 411 elderly people aged 65 or older from 10 villages in Gyeongnam. The survey tools were the K-FRAIL for frailty, the GDS-SF for depression, the SARC-F questionnaire for sarcopenia, and the DETERMINE for nutritional status. Frequency analysis, the chi-square test, and multiple logistic regression analysis were performed using the SPSS 25.0 program. Results: As a result of the chi-square test, there was a significant difference in the nutritional status and the frailty proportion (p<0.001), and there was a significant difference between frailty and suspected sarcopenia (p<0.001). After adjustment, nutritional status was significantly associated with sarcopenia (OR=2.946, p<0.001). In addition, nutritional status was significantly associated with frailty (OR=2.958, p<0.001), and sarcopenia also had a significant effect on frailty (OR=5.898, p<0.001). Finally, even after including sarcopenia, nutritional status had a significant effect on frailty (OR=2.246, p=0.002). Conclusions: Nutritional status can have both a direct effect on frailty and an indirect effect through sarcopenia, and it was found that sarcopenia also affects frailty. Therefore, it is necessary to evaluate sarcopenia and nutritional status and to evaluate their levels in the elderly and to take appropriate interventions.

• The Journal of Korean Physical Therapy
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• v.15 no.1
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• pp.61-81
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• 2003

There can be little dissension that the ultimate goal of all physical therapy interventions with the elderly is to restore or maintain the highest level of function possible for the individual. Whenever physical therapists take on this challenge, they assist elders in maintaining their identities as competent adults. Advancing age is associated with profound changes in body composition, including increased fat mass, decreased fat-free mass(particularly muscle), decreased total body water and decreased bone density. Along with these changes in body compositions, and perhaps as a direct result of them, elderly people have lower energy needs, reduced strength and functional capacity and a greatly increased risk for such diseases as noninsulin-dependent diabetes mellitus and osteoporosis. Resistance training is considered a promising intervention for reversing the loss of muscle function and the deterioration of muscle structure that is associated with advanced age. This reversal is thought to result in improvements in functional abilities and health status in the elderly by increasing muscle mass, strength and power and by increasing bone mineral density. In the past couple of decades, many studies have examined the effects of Resistance training on risk factors for age-related diseases or disabilities. We have explored the positive and negative aspects of older adults' participation in resistance training programs. The benefits to older adults are reported to be increased strength, endurance, muscle capacity, and flexibility; more energy; and improved self-image and confidence. The negative aspects include some pain or stiffness and other nonspecific problems. The positive and negative aspects of resistance training are therefore very similar to those in younger populations. Scientific investigations over the past 10 years have demonstrated that resistance training can be safely and successfully implemented in older populations. Even the frail and very sick elderly can benefit and improve their quality of life. Proper design and progression of a resistance training program for older adults is vital to optimal benefits from resistance exercise. The results of data provided by this research on resistance training for health shows that there is enough existing evidence to conclude that resistance training, particularly when incorporated into a comprehensive fitness program, can offer substantial health benefits which can be obtained by persons of all ages. These benefits, including improvements in functional capacity, translate into an improved quality of life.

• KIEAE Journal
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• v.11 no.5
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• pp.119-127
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• 2011

The aging population has been increasing in Korea so that it is difficult for people to understand the change of the future society. This study aimed to analyze the characteristics of preliminary retiree's alternative housing preference by providing an accurate information about residential current issues and the seriousness brought by the aging society. It explained the visual information about the aspect of the residential change due to the aging society to 104 preliminary retirees who live in the apartment in Seoul. It surveyed the characteristics of the alternative housing preference following 4 situations of the Old age type(couple/healthy, couple/ill, single/healthy, single/ill). It analyzed the difference of housing preference before and after providing information. The results are as follows: First, a previous apartment is not enough to prepare the aging society and UIBS(unit insertion building system) for the elderly was expected to be a great help to the frail after 2026. Second, the preference of UIBS was increased after providing information of the aging society. Third, in the case of the illness, a big city with medical facilities was preferred not to move in the suburb. Fourth, after providing information, a small size of apartment was preferred but the preferred change of housing ownership was not founded. Last, there was considerable difference before and after providing information under 4 situation of Old age type. These results showed the feasibility of coping with more accurate future society only if a survey should be taken with providing sufficient information about the aging society.