• Journal of Korean Academy of Fundamentals of Nursing
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• v.16 no.3
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• pp.333-344
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• 2009

Purpose: This study was done to identify differences in health habits, perceived stress, depression, and suicidal thinking by gender for elderly people who are living alone and elderly people who are living with others. Method: The study participants were 4,051 people aged 65 years and over who were surveyed in the Third Korea National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey in 2005. The relationship among outcomes and living arrangement by gender in elders was assessed using multiple logistic regression while controlling for sociodemographic characteristics. Results: Older men living alone were less likely to have breakfast and more likely to perceive stress and think of suicide than older men living with family or others. On the other hand, older women who live alone were less likely to perceive stress than older women who live with others. Age, educational level, income, and number of diseases were significantly associated with each individual outcome. Conclusion: This study showed that living alone has a significant impact on physical health habits and psychological health of elderly people, especially for older men. Therefore, living arrangement should be considered in developing a health promotion program for elders as well as age, gender, education, and income.

• Journal of Family Resource Management and Policy Review
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• v.23 no.1
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• pp.17-34
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• 2019

Older women who live alone are among society's most vulnerable people, since they experience increased risk of multiple chronic diseases and have limited financial protection. This can lead older women living alone to catastrophic health expenditure(CHE), which is defined as a healthcare expenditure that exceeds a certain portion of a household's ability to pay. Using the Korean Longitudinal Study of Ageing(KLoSA), this study investigated the incidence of CHE among older women living alone and identified the factors related to this incidence. Applying health expenditure thresholds of 10%, 20%, 30% and 40% of ability to pay, the proportions of those with CHE were 41.3%, 22.9%, 14.6%, and 9.4%, respectively. Logistic regression models were used to identify factors related to CHE incidence, which include demographics, income, the number of chronic diseases, perceived health status, and health insurance type. The results show that the health care safety net in South Korea is insufficient for older women living alone. The findings can guide policymakers in improving healthcare and welfare policies to protect people from catastrophic payments. Particularly, welfare policies should be established for poor non-recipients who are not included within the benefits scope of the National Basic Livelihood Security System due to the unrealistic criteria of income recognition and family support obligation.

• Journal of the Korea Safety Management & Science
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• v.11 no.3
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• pp.73-78
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• 2009

In this paper, we developed the care system for older people living alone using the RFID technologies and the living informations. The care system store living informations, extracted through a unconstrained detection method by the RFID tags and readers, into a monitering server. The unconstrained detection method improved a weakness of existing systems that detected a living informations through an infrared sensor, ultrasonic sensor, camera, consumed quantity of the tap water or gas. The result of this study will playa very important role, as a part of a composite older-welfare services. Also, in the future, accumulated living informations will be allowed for a health data of older peoples.

• The Journal of Korean Society for School & Community Health Education
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• v.22 no.3
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• pp.69-81
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• 2021

Purpose: This study purposed to analyze of factors related to suicidal ideation among people with and without disabilities in elderly living alone Methods: The study examines the factors of suicidal ideation using over 65 years of age who participated in the 2017 National Survey of Older Koreans of the elderly living alone data. Subjects were 2,265 person among elderly living alone over 65 years of age. Data were analyzed using descriptive statistics, X²-test, t-test, logistic regression analysis with the SPSS win 26.0 program. Results: Suicidal ideation of the elderly living alone with disabilities were 13.6% and 9.0% of the elderly living alone without disabilities, and the elderly living alone with disabilities had higher suicidal ideation (p<.05). The significant predictors of the suicidal ideation in elderly living alone with disabilities were employment and depression. The significant predictors of the suicidal ideation in elderly living alone without disabilities were age, gender, number of chronic disease, economic state, SLCA(Society, leisure, culture, and activities) and depression. Depression was analyzed as a common factor related to suicidal ideation in disabled and non-disabled elderly living alone. Conclusion: Based on the results of this study, it is necessary to develop a program for people with and without disabilities. It is necessary to prepare various programs and community support systems to prevent and manage depression for people with and without disabilities in elderly living alone.

• Journal of Community Nutrition
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• v.7 no.1
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• pp.21-28
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• 2005

In order to investigate the differences in nutrient intakes and eating habits between people living alone and people living together with family or others by age group, dietary survey data of the subjects aged 20 years or older from 2001 Korean National Health and Nutrition Survey were analyzed. Living status of the subjects was defined as 'single' when the subjects' household member was one person. Age, gender, income, education were adjusted during the comparative analysis. The subjects living alone had diets with lower score of nutritional adequacy ratio and lower quality, and drank more alcoholic beverages when compared with the subjects living together. Females were more greatly affected in dietary intakes by living alone situation than males. Of the four age groups, a group with ages from 30 to 39 years showed less nutrient intake patterns in persons living alone than in persons living together, but the rest three groups with ages from 20 to 29, from 50 to 64, and 65 or older did not show any significant differences. Eating habits of the subjects living alone, such as skipping meals, kinds of snacks, dining-out, were worse as a whole than the other. In conclusion, single living particularly of females or of 30 to 39 years of age group had negative influences on dietary intakes and behavior. There may be statistical errors if socioeconomic and demographic factors such as age, gender, income, and education are not controlled in the population study investigating the effect of living alone on dietary intakes. Further studies will be needed to know the age-specific reasons for the worse nutrient intakes of single living persons.

• Journal of the Korea Safety Management & Science
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• v.19 no.2
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• pp.101-106
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• 2017

Purpose The purpose of this study is to investigate the quality of life and stress level of the elderly living alone in their neighborhood volunteers. Methods Data collection was done from July 1 to October 1, 2015 and the data were collected by self-reported questionnaire at Nowon community in Seoul area in South Korea. The subjects were 146 older adults living alone agreed to participate in the study(accepted by IRB). The questionnaire was constructed with quality of life 26 items, 5-point Likert type scale(1-5), stress 15 items, 5-point Likert type. The data were analyzed by descriptive statistics. Results Socially isolated older adults had significantly higher scores ($3.7{\pm}.03$) in quality of life, moderate scores ($2.9{\pm}.03$) in stress. Conclusion The peer support undertaken by older community volunteers was effective in improving quality of life in socially isolated older adults. It is necessary to listen to the voice of elderly people living alone through the activation of volunteer groups in the community.

• Journal of The Korea Institute of Healthcare Architecture
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• v.13 no.2
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• pp.19-26
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• 2007

As a result of rapid aging speed in our society, it is necessary to supply a lot of housing for older people in near future. When we think that high portion of residence in rental housing complex composed of small units is the elderly, the housing units in those apartments have to be designed for the physical, mental, social, and economical conditions of elderly people who lives in such a residential complex. Considering these living conditions of the elderly, this study proposes a remodeling prototype of a living unit for older people in rental housing complex. For the research of this topic, various characteristics of the elderly and the environmental requirements for them firstly have been analysed from the literature survey and the interviews with two residents living in a rental apartment. And the design considerations for each space of the housing unit such as entrance, living room, bed room, bath room, and so forth have been explored. Based on the design guidelines above, the remodeling plan of a housing unit for older people has been propose as a result of this study.

• Journal of Families and Better Life
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• v.35 no.1
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• pp.1-16
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• 2017

Using data from the 2015 Korea Welfare Panel Study, we examined the predictors of psychological well-being (life satisfaction and depression) of single elderly people living alone across development stages (young-old, mid-old, and old-old) and suggested implications for elderly policy. For this purpose, we selected 1,364 elderly people who lived alone but preserved their family relationships, and were 65 years of age or older. Separate analyses were conducted for the three groups of single elderly people living alone. Overall, the psychological well-being of single elderly people living alone was higher than moderate level, and they were generally satisfied with their everyday lives and less depressed. However, there were group differences: the young-old group was more satisfied than the old-old group with in their everyday lives and less depressed than the mid-old and old-old groups. In the young-old group, life satisfaction was significantly associated with subjective health, non-physical conflict with family, disposal income, house ownership, dietary deficiency, cost of living, and public pension. In addition, depression was significantly associated with subjective health, non-physical conflict with family, dietary deficiency, and physical conflict with family. In the mid-old group, life satisfaction was significantly associated with subjective health, housing non-physical conflict with family, disposal income, and dietary deficiency. Depression was significantly associated with subjective health, housing deficiency. In the old-old group, life satisfaction was significantly associated with subjective health and non-physical conflict with family. Depression was significantly associated with subjective health. Therefore, 'health'and 'family'are important key concepts to consider when making elderly policy.

• Journal of Families and Better Life
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• v.20 no.5
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• pp.51-67
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• 2002

The purpose of this study is to find the role and issues of housing management under the community care system which cover the middle class older people. Research method was qualitative research by the interview of 21 subjects with open-ended questionnaire. Most of the older people want to live in the community alone with poor supporting system, because present community care system does not established well, so it cannot cover the staying put service for independent living, such as community alarm, care and repair, handyman, floating support, and meal service within the community. The result showed that community care might be partially avaliable from the welfare center but not well established or transfer to Dong-Office as an agency of community welfare center. However, the subjects had higher needs about housing management for older people than previous study on the hypothetical level. Successful pilot project might be required to develop the community care system focused on housing management for older people.

• Journal of People, Plants, and Environment
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• v.21 no.6
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• pp.557-564
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• 2018

Along with the aging society, the prevalence of dementia is also increasing. Dementia causes short-term memory loss as well as difficulties of performing daily activities and gradually causes suffering of the patients and their family. In spite of various programs for prevention of dementia of older people are being implemented, there is a lack of developing natural-based program for physical and mental health promotion. Therefore, it is necessary to develop programs for the elderly living alone who are more vulnerable to dementia because of their social and economic isolation. The purpose of this study was to develop a natural-based program and investigate the effects of 10 weeks forest therapy program for dementia prevention to improve the psychological and physical health of the elderly living alone. The experimental subjects were 30 elderly (aged 65 or older) and 31 elderly participated in control group. The Stress response, depressive symptoms, weight, body mass index (BMI), fat mass and muscle mass were measured for pre and post test. The results showed that the experimental group showed subjective stress relief (t=5.249, p=.000), improvement in symptoms of depression (t=4.152, p=.000), and decreases in weight (t=2.686, p=.012), BMI (t=2.629, p=.014) and fat mass (t=2.918, p=.007) after the forest therapy program. The experimental group showed lower stress reactions(t=-7.185, p=.000) and less depressive symptoms (t=-5.303, p=.000) than control group after participating the program. These results suggest that periodic forest exposure can help having less stressful and depressive status than non-forest exposure and the forest therapy program can reduce participants' psychological and physical risk factors of dementia.