• Journal of Community Nutrition
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• v.6 no.2
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• pp.103-109
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• 2004

Body antioxidant status is an important factor for the prevention of many chronic diseases in the elderly. This study was done to investigate antioxidant status and its relationship to immune response by measuring plasma cytokine (IL-2 and IL-6) levels in elderly women. Subjects were 76 elderly women aged over 60 years, visiting Jangwhi Social Welfare Center of Seongbook-Gu in Seoul. Subjects were divided into 3 groups according to age (< 65, 65 - 74, > 75). Dietary intakes were assessed by semi-quantitative food frequency questionnaires (SFFQ). Plasma vitamin C level was measured by 2,4-dinitrophenylhydrazine method and plasma levels of vitamin E, A and ${\beta}$-carotene were measured by HPLC. Plasma levels of IL-2 and IL-6 were determined with a solid phase sandwich enzyme linked-immuno-sorbent assay (ELISA) using commercial kits. The average intakes of antioxidant vitamins were 96.3mg (137.5% of RDA) for vitamin C and 523.3 ${\mu}$gRE (74.8% of RDA) for vitamin A in elderly women. All of the average plasma levels of antioxidant vitamins were within normal range. However the percentage of the elderly women with deficiency plus marginal values were 7.9% in vitamin C, 9.2% in vitamin A and 7.9% in vitamin E. Plasma levels of IL-2 and IL-6 were 27.1${\pm}$7.1pg/ml and 5.9${\pm}$5.3pg/ml in elderly women. Correlation data showed that plasma IL-2 level was negatively correlated with plasma vitamin C level. In addition, IL-6 level was also negatively correlated with plasma vitamin C, A and E levels, respectively. There was a significant positive correlation between erythrocyte thiobarbituric acid-reactive substance(TB-ARS) level and plasma IL-2 or IL-6 levels. In addition, erythrocyte TBARS level showed a significant positive correlation with plasma total antioxidant status (TAS) level and a significant negative correlation with plasma vitamin C level. Overall results might imply that the decreased levels of antioxidant vitamins result in an increase in oxidative stress and thereby increase cytokine production such as IL-2 and IL-6. However further research is required to elucidate these relationships.

• Korean Journal of Human Ecology
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• v.18 no.4
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• pp.971-984
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• 2009

The purpose of this study was to analyse the relations among the residents' characteristics, the policy of the facility, and the physical characteristics of activity areas, and to understand the elements for the lively use of activity areas in the elderly nursing facilities. The results of the study are as follows: First, there was a relationship between the characteristics of semi-public activity areas and the residents' management-control policy. The facilities having semi-public areas of living room type showed more flexibility in time and place and more respects for the residents. Second, the activity areas of connection type were much more used than the compartment type, especially in the facilities having more residents incapable of walking. On the other hand, the facilities having high control for the residents showed high using rate in public activity areas, and all those did not have semi-public areas or showed low using rate in there. Third, in the analysis of the relationship between the physical characteristics and the using rate of activity areas, the public activity areas having compartment type in the spatial composition and hall as a form were likely to have multiple usages. On the whole, the various form of activity areas, the area per residents, openness, accessibility and centrality were having interactions each other for high using rate in activity areas. Especially, many stimulations and the furniture arrangements that were good for the residents' interactions had a function of compensation for the poor physical characteristics of activity areas. This study investigated only the using rates to understand the lively use of the space. For the future study, it is suggested that the detail using behavior of the residents should be examined to understand the influential elements.

• 한국노년학
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• v.37 no.3
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• pp.617-635
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• 2017

The aim of this study was to investigate both poverty and depression among older adults, focusing on the relationship of these two trajectories. For expanding the understanding about elderly poverty and depression, the study measured the longitudinal patterns of various transition in these two variables. The data for the study is 1st to 9th waves (2006-2014) of Korea Welfare Panel Study (KoWePS), and 4,431 older adults were used for the final analysis. For data analysis, Semi-parametric group-based modeling and Dual trajectory model were selected. The main results of this study were followings; First, The trajectory groups were identified: non-poverty, decrease poverty, increase poverty, remain high-poverty, chronic poverty groups and 4 trajectories of depression: stable, remain low-depression, risk of depression, chronic depression groups. Second, the study was tried to anticipate the longitudinal transition of poverty and depression status, and investigate the concurrent relationship in these two variables. It turned out that the stable poverty status led the stable depression, and vice versa. Based on these result, this study for elderly welfare were discussed to reduce risk for poverty and depression.

• Korean Journal of Health Education and Promotion
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• v.20 no.4
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• pp.1-11
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• 2003

The main purposes of this study were to investigate the content of health behaviors and to examine factors influencing the health behaviors of the elderly. Data regarding the health behavior of 126 people over 65 years of age living in community settings were used. All subjects were interviewed using a semi-structured questionnaire. The questionnaire consisted of sociodemographic variables, health behaviors, present chronic disease, subjective health status, a scale for worthy life, a scale for self-esteem, and a scale for loneliness. Health behaviors included 27questions on diet, exercise, stress-coping, smoking, drinking, a regular medical check-up, social activities, etc. The data analysis procedure included stepwise regression using health behavior as the dependent variable, and sociodemographics, illness, and psychosocial variables as independent variables. Stepwise regression revealed that factors such as feelings of worthy life($\beta$＝-0.350, p＜0.0001), communicating with otjers or the lack there of ($\beta$＝0.183, p＜0.05), and self-esteem($\beta$＝0.196, p＜0.05) were independently and significantly associated with health behaviors. For example, individuals who showed higher levels of worthy life and who had confiding relationships with others tended to practice more health behaviors. Subjects who had a higher level of self-esteem showed the same tendency. These results suggest the necessity of a intervention that considers psychosocial aspects should be included in care of the elderly so as to promote positive health behavior.

• Journal of People, Plants, and Environment
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• v.21 no.6
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• pp.565-574
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• 2018

Previous studies have shown that forest therapy program can help prevent dementia. However, few studies have focused on low-income elderly people living alone. The current study examined the meanings that the elderly living alone receiving medical care assigned to the urban forest therapy program, as a way to understand the pathways that nature-based intervention affect preventing dementia. Twenty-one participants were recruited and they participated in a five-week urban forest therapy program. Semi-structured interviews were carried out with 21 participants who experienced the urban forest therapy program, and analyzed qualitative data using thematic analysis. Results showed that all themes identified were related to connectedness with oneself, neighbors and nature. Awarenesses of change were consisted of positive and negative themes. The themes of positive awareness were improvements of mental and emotional condition, feelings of isolation and loneliness, and health-related lifestyle. The negative themes were terminations of short-term programs and inconvenient access to the urban forest. Based on these data, we suggest an urban green welfare framework for future research and interventions for preventing dementia of underprivileged elderly group.

• Journal of Information Processing Systems
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• v.14 no.4
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• pp.1010-1032
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• 2018

Recent advances in medical science have made people live longer, which has affected many aspects of life, such as caregiver burden, increasing cost of healthcare, increasing number of disabled and depressive disorder persons, and so on. Researchers are now focused on elderly living assistance services in smart home environments. In recent years, assisted living technologies have rapidly grown due to a faster growing aging society. Many smart devices are now interconnected within the home network environment and such a home setup supports collaborations between those devices based on the Internet of Things (IoT). One of the major challenges in providing elderly living assistance services is to consider each individual's requirements of different needs. In order to solve this, the virtualization of physical things, as well as the collaboration and composition of services provided by these physical things should be considered. In order to meet these challenges, Web of Objects (WoO) focuses on the implementation aspects of IoT to bring the assorted real world objects with the web applications. We proposed a semantic modelling technique for manual and semi-automated service composition. The aim of this work is to propose a framework to enable RESTful web services composition using semantic ontology for elderly living assistance services creation in WoO based smart home environment.

• Journal of Korean Academy of Nursing
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• v.41 no.1
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• pp.61-71
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• 2011

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to examine the meaning and essence of suicide for elderly people who had previously attempted suicide as an older person. Methods: Giorgi's descriptive phenomenology was used for analysis. The researchers carried out in-depth interviews, recordings and memos individually with four elders. The elders were individuals who had attempted suicide sometime in the past 5 yr. They were interviewed from 5 to 10 times using open-ended questions and a semi-structural format. Demographic data were also collected. Results: The meaning of suicide before a suicide attempt in older people had four core components: conflict with family, powerlessness and despair in their life with a drop in self-esteem, using internal and external resources to resolve their troubles and awareness of imminent crisis. Conclusion: These results of this study will increase understanding of suicide in older people by defining their subjective experience of suicide attempts and applying grounded data in the development of programs that provide concrete intervention strategies to prevent suicide in elderly people.

• The Journal of the Convergence on Culture Technology
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• v.7 no.1
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• pp.11-16
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• 2021

Recently, community welfare centers including the elderly welfare centers are also interested in the issue of loneliness and are attempting a comprehensive approach to care for the elderly in the community.The problem is that there is a need for volunteers who are sustainable, but trained semi-professionals rather than non-professionals.Therefore, ways to provide education programs that can be based on continuous supplementation and specialization of manpower and to apply them to the field are being sought.The purpose of this study is to present a plan through examples with the aim of linking college students majoring in social welfare as a major resource for preventing loneliness of elderly people living alone in local communities through volunteer activities. It was suggested that volunteer activities of college students majoring in social welfare should be provided more systematically to the elderly living alone in the community.

• Korean Journal of Community Nutrition
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• v.12 no.5
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• pp.592-605
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• 2007

Undernutrition could be a significant deterrent to healthy aging and could negatively affect health outcomes in elderly. This study aimed to assess health-related factors which are associated with nutritional risks in middle-aged and elderly individuals by a cross-sectional study. Interviews were conducted with 2660 subjects (847 males, 1813 females), aged 50 years and over, in 15 cities in Korea. Data on food intake were obtained through a validated semi-quantitative food frequency questionnaires. Nutritional status were analyzed according to health-related factors including cigarette smoking, alcohol drinking, exercise, stress and depression level. Less regular exercise was associated with a higher likelihood of a poor nutrition [odds ratio (OR) 1.94; 95% confidence intervals (CI) 1.43-2.65] of middle-aged and elderly male subjects. Cigarette smoking (OR 1.84; 95% CI 1.24-2.71), less exercise (OR 2.58; 95% CI 2.07-3.21), stress (OR 1.73; 95% CI 1.36-2.22), and depression (OR 1.34, 95% CI 1.08-1.67) of middle-aged and elderly female subjects was associated with a higher likelihood of a poor nutrition. The results of the multiple regression analysis showed that less exercise proved to be the strongest predictors for the poor nutrition, followed by stress, smoking, and depression (model $R^2= 9.0%$). It suggests that guidance to promote regular exercise, to quit smoking, to minimize stress and depression level might help to improve nutritional status of middle-aged and elderly in Korea. These findings also suggest that having recommendable health behaviors are beneficial to the good nutrition of subjects aged 50 years and over.

• Journal of Korean Academy of Oral Health
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• v.42 no.4
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• pp.204-209
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• 2018

Objectives: This study was conducted to identify the demand and willingness to pay for oral hygiene services among elderly people with long-term care insurance. Methods: Our study was a cross-sectional analysis. Subjects comprised 126 elderly individuals from long-term home-care centers. A total of 28 centers were selected through convenience sampling from among 78 centers in ${\bigcirc}{\bigcirc}$. For analysis, semi-structured questionnaires that required about 20-30 minutes to complete were used. Analysis was performed using SPSS 23.0 software. Results: The overall demand for oral hygiene services was 44.4%, and willingness to pay was 31.0%. Thirty-three people (58.9%) of elderly those who have demand for an oral hygiene service were willing to pay for the service, and 64 people (91.4%) who did not have a demand were not willing to pay for it. Among those with partial dependence on brushing, 65.6% had demand for oral hygiene services and 50.0% were willing to pay costs. Among basic livelihood beneficiaries, 69.6% were willing to pay for oral hygiene services; general subjects and relievers were less willing to pay. Conclusions: The overall demand for oral hygiene services among elderly people was 44.4%, and the willingness to pay was as low as 31.0%.