• Proceeding of Spring/Autumn Annual Conference of KHA
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• 2006.11a
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• pp.149-154
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• 2006

The purpose of this study is to introduce ubiquitous home services for the aged. In comparison with general ubiquitous homes, ubiquitous homes for the aged have two major characteristics. First, the service contents should be expanded and strengthened. Second, the services should be customized to each individuals. The primary objective of a ubiquitous home for the aged is health care. The three affordances for this objective are 1)prevention of sickness and reducing the speed of aging process, 2)technical assistance for disability, 3)recovering and enhancing the physical and cognitive function. For this purpose this paper analyses the characteristics of the aged and current ubiquitous technology and ubiquitous home service, thus providing an outline for ubiquitous services necessary for aged people.

• Korean Institute of Interior Design Journal
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• v.20 no.6
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• pp.208-217
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• 2011

Recently the importance of the elderly facilities and the eco-friendly buildings is on the rise, due to the rapid increase of the aged population and the more and more serious global environment issues, respectively. Thus, the purpose of this study is to suggest an eco-environmental improvement plan which aims to improve the quality of life for the aged in planning nursing homes hereafter by reviewing the theory of the eco-friendly architectural concept and the same conceptual design, which become the issues of late, and thus analyzing the state of applying the eco-friendly design techniques to the municipal nursing homes located in Seoul. In this study its direction of the eco-friendly design required in nursing homes was established by reviewing the characteristics which the aged and nursing homes may have, and thus extracting the elements required for the quality of life for them. The theoretical studies showed that the environment-friendly natural elements necessary for the nursing houses are light, air and plants, from which three design elements are obtained: daylighting, natural ventilation and natural landscape. In conclusion, the eco-friendly nursing homes must be planned to improve the quality of life for the aged by recognizing that the eco-friendly architecture concept, emerged as a new paradigm, is the one to be put before all the considerations for those who are sensitive to the environment, and thus reviewing the characteristics found out from them.

• Asian Journal for Public Opinion Research
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• v.4 no.1
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• pp.38-50
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• 2016

Introduction: Geriatric depression is one of the significant mental health issues for older people. This descriptive study aimed to investigate the correlation between selected factors and depression among older people, living in homes for the aged in the western part of Thailand. Methods: 107 older people, living in two homes for the aged of the western part of Thailand were recruited to the study, using cluster sampling. Three questionnaires, including the Barthel Index Activity of Daily living (BADL), the Thai Geriatric Depression Scale (TGDS), and personal characteristics, perceived health status, chronic diseases, family relationship, and recent grief and loss experience were used. The quality of all questionnaires, especially the reliability of BADL, TGDS, and selected factors (e.g., health factors) were 0.95, 0.93, and 0.72 respectively. After finishing data collection, percentages, medians, and Spearman's rank correlation and Mann-Whitney U were used to analyze the data. Results and discussion: The results revealed that nearly half (41.1%) of older people suffered from depression. Furthermore, income, perceived health status, and Barthel ADL index were significantly negatively associated with depression at p<0.01; whereas, the number of chronic diseases was significantly positively associated with depression at p<0.05. Conclusion: results on the correlation may guide the practice in the future. For example, the officers or health care providers in homes for the aged should encourage older people to be independent, improve their perceived health status, increase health promoting behaviors to prevent or delay chronic illnesses, or increase older people incomes by promoting the appropriate occupation.

• The Journal of the Korea Contents Association
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• v.8 no.10
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• pp.151-157
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• 2008

This study aims to construct the aged portal sites based on multimedia DB on the basis of request for systematic collection and management of the aged-related specific information which are spreading and construct Multimedia Information System for the Aged by developing digital contents to offer the aged-related information. It also tries to construct ontology based information repository for the aged that includes on/off-line. It extracts semantic relationship of each information by analysing the aged information, knows the hierarchical structure of each vocabulary, and designs and constructs an ontology based repository by designing function of each agent through that. It has also developed a variety of information and digital contents, constructed a systematic multimedia DB for the aged welfare homes, developed web framework which makes automatic registration of the aged welfare homes possible, and designed in order to support the use state of enterprises/homes and statistics state.

• Journal of Korean Academy of Nursing
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• v.46 no.6
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• pp.858-870
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• 2016

Purpose: The purpose of the study was to explore and describe the adaptation process of older people to group homes. Methods: Participants were twenty older adults aged 65 or older who were living in group homes. Data were collected from January to April, 2015. In-depth unstructured interviews were conducted with individual participants. Data were analyzed using Strauss and Corbin's grounded theory method. Results: From open coding, 100 concepts, 38 sub-categories, and 14 categories were identified. Analysis showed that the central phenomenon of the adaptation process of older people to group homes was 'gradually giving up'. Causal conditions were 'good-for-nothing body', contextual conditions were 'pushed', 'beleaguered'. Intervening conditions were 'reliable pillar: children', 'having affection (情) more than having it from family: facility workers', 'comfort - like feeling at home', 'relieved: system'. Action/interaction strategies were 'facing the unfamiliar reality', 'building relationships with other people', 'accepting reality'. Consequences were 'a good place, more than expected', 'hope for the remaining days', 'waiting for a peaceful death'. Conclusion: The results of this study provide an in-depth understanding of the experience of the adaptation process of older people to group homes. The findings from this study can be used as basic data to establish policies to increase the number of small scale facilities which can help older adults adapt easily to the facilities.

• Journal of the Korean housing association
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• v.9 no.3
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• pp.69-77
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• 1998

This study has been performed to analyze living arrangement in later life. In this study, 276 Koreans aged 60 or more were interviewed for their current household structure. The results are drawn as follows: 1. Of all the households with at least one person aged 60 or more, those living in three generations account for the largest proportion, 39.9 percent. For the regional difference, the rate was slightly higher in urban areas than in rural areas. 2. 48.7% of the subjects living in owned homes were households with elderly only, but only 23% of those living in rented homes are elderly only. Overall, the rate of elderly-only households becomes the highest for those living in owned single structure homes. This result indicates that the elderly with higher economic status are more likely to live without children than others. 3. As for birth order, those who grew up as the first child are most likely to live in elderly-only households, while others are in three generation homes. 4. The elderly with few children are more likely to live independently than those with many children, not because they are without dependable children, but because spend less resource for childbearing and therefore are more independent. 5. Overall in this, it is supported that socioeconomic status and independability are more influential factors on living arrangement of the elderly than regional or emotional factors.

• Journal of the Korean housing association
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• v.26 no.5
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• pp.53-60
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• 2015

This study is aimed at identifying and evaluating the current operating model of elderly group homes in Korea, which were introduced with the amendment to the Welfare of the Aged Act in 2008, based on a survey of 25 managers of such homes. There are several key themes identified in the evaluation of their operation in terms of human resources, service, space and finance. The number of employees at the homes complied with the applicable law, with the majority having more employees than the minimum legal requirement for the care of residents. A wide variety of service programs were offered for residents. Typically located within detached houses purchased on the first floor, the homes varied in size from 73 square meters to 560 square meters, with each having a distinctly residence-like atmosphere. The greatest challenge such homes face was a shortage of financial resources. Many struggled to operate because they have no other source of revenue than payments from residents. Consequently, to help promote elderly group homes, there needs to be state-level support for the view that providing assistance for self-sufficient elders can save social costs in the long run by delaying their transition to a physical state requiring constant nursing.

• Korean journal of food and cookery science
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• v.29 no.5
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• pp.511-523
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• 2013

This research involved a survey on the dietary patterns of children and adolescents living in group homes, to find out their wrong eating habits and to devise measures for correcting their problems. The BMIs of the subject children and adolescents in group homes were measured, and the result showed that although many of them appeared to have normal weights, about 42.2% were actually underweight. Most of them had meals regularly, three times a day at fixed times. However, half of them frequently skipped breakfast because of the lack of time in the morning. In addition, more than half of them had the habit of having imbalanced diets, especially with low vegetable intake. The score for their satisfaction toward meals at group homes were highest (3.97) with the taste of food, while it was relatively lower (3.61) with the variety of food than with the other items. The average score for their snack intake was 3.47, showing that the majority of them had the habit of eating snacks, while the largest portion (26.0%) of them preferred bread and cookies. According to the result of the analysis on their food intake, overall calorie intake was about 82~96% of estimated energy requirements, while that of the male subjects aged 12 or older was about 82% of the standard energy requirements. Their overall intake of calcium and potassium was lower than recommended nutrition intake, but sodium intake was higher than 3 times recommended intake. Especially, in addition to calcium and potassium, the male subjects aged 15 or older showed low intake of dietary fiber, iron, zinc, riboflavin, niacin, vitamin C and folate also; whereas the female subjects aged 15 or older showed low intake of iron, zinc, riboflavin and folate also. Taken together, it was concluded that government level of dietary life-related support and management would be necessary for the healthy growth and development of children and adolescents in group homes.

• Journal of the Korean Home Economics Association
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• v.40 no.4
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• pp.1-12
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• 2002

This study aimed to examine the needs for the planning of group homes for the elderly with dementia in lower income class, who have more economic burden on the caring the demented aged. The survey was conducted by questionnaires collected from 300 respondents from December 2000 to March 2001. Methods of analysis were frequency distribution, mean and chi-square test. The results of this study were as follows: 1) The respondents perceived that the responsibility to take care of the elderly with dementia belonged to their family, not to society or the government, and the sons and daughters had to share the burden placed on care-givers. 2) The awareness of group homes for dementia was relatively low. 3) The respondents' needs for the group homes with dementia could be summarized as follows; small scale plan with homelike atmosphere, a total of 6-8 residents, structural type of detached house or three-storied town house, 2-3 persons per individual room, and management system by non-profit organization or the government. There were no big differences between the respondents of this study and upper and middle class studies conducted by other research, except for some details. Referring to results of this study, it is asserted that group homes for the elderly with dementia would be embraced throughout the country if poetical assistance combined with economic support were provided.

• Journal of the Korean housing association
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• v.19 no.2
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• pp.31-42
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• 2008

Research outcome shows the following: 1. Estimation by the year 2015 on the number of the aged people and on the number of the household of living alone and living with spouse only, per age-cohort by 5 years, per basic self-govern-ins local groups and the city of Daegu. The result is supposed to serve as meaningful basic material in building up future policies in many areas for the aged people living in their homes. 2. Estimation varies according to the areas and the age-cohorts. In urban areas, increase of the numbers of the households of the aged people living alone and living with spouse only is estimated in every age-cohort. In rural areas, variance between two age-groups, old-old and young-old, is observed. Both of the numbers of the households for the aged living alone and the aged living with spouse only have increased continuously by the year 2005. But the hither-to increase tendency is estimated to reverse itself to a decrease starting from the younger within the young-old age group, and the ratio of the old-old age-group in rural population will sharply increase starting from the year 2005. Such increase in the number of the aged people in need of the housing and the social support requires the increasing policy consideration for the issue of housing for the aged living in their homes. In spite of the decreasing tendency in the number of the aged people living alone and living with spouse only in rural areas, still there will continue to be more number of such households than in urban area for the time being. The government of Gyeongsangbuk-Do should pay more consideration to the old-old aged living alone and living with spouse only in rural areas, while being prepared for the sharply increasing households for the aged living alone and living with spouse only in urban areas.