• Journal of Families and Better Life
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• v.26 no.3
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• pp.79-99
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• 2008

Nowadays, social circumstances have changed rapidly due to the decreasing birthrate and increasing number of senior citizens. Therefore, it is necessary to investigate past research for presenting the direction of future research and for improvement of welfare for the elderly. For this study a total of 231 articles within four kinds of major home economics journals are used. The articles were published from 2000 to 2007. Specific research topics (subjects) are investigated for this study. Results from this study are as follows. Research topics are divided into the following fields: facilities for the elderly, family relationships in later life, quality of life, economical aspects of the elderly, physical and metal health, leisure, awareness and the attitudes about elderly people, clothing, death and welfare services for elders. According to this study, 'facilities for the elderly' and 'relationships in later life' are the most frequent topics of interest. Based on the results of this research and the governmental aging society plan, SEROMAZI PLAN 2010, the directions of future research about senior citizens and later life in our home economics major science field are presented.

• Korean Journal of Community Nutrition
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• v.21 no.1
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• pp.65-74
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• 2016

Objectives: This study was performed to investigate the nutritional status, health conditions, eating habits and experience and demand for nutrition dietary management of senior citizens. And these data are formed foundation of development of nutrition dietary management education program and contents in welfare facilities for the aged. Methods: We visited 3 public health centers, 3 senior citizens centers, and 4 welfare centers in Seoul, Gyeonggi-do, Chungnam province, and Daejeon area and carried out interview by semi-structured questionnaire for senior citizens older than 65 years who use those facilities. Results: The study included 17%, 30.7% and 52.3% of senior citizens from public health centers, seniorcitizen centers and and welfare centers, respectively. The age range of 43.9% of the population was 65-74 years and and 56.1% were older than 75 years. We observed that 83.2% of subjects took some medicines due to diseases that they have and 58.0% took prescription medicines for hypertension. The thing that they considered the most when selecting food was 'the taste'(p<0.05). Regarding the level of practice to keep the dietary life, they answered more than 'average' for most of items but answered less than 'average' for lot of salt intake, drinking, exercise. For the experience of nutrition dietary life education, only 19.8% answered 'Yes' and the service for nutrition dietary life management showed the highest score in the demand for 'provide nutritious food'. For the size of consulting group for nutrition/dietary life education, the public health center and welfare center preferred a larger group size but the senior citizens center preferred a smaller group. With regard to who will carry out the consulting, the demand for dietitian was the highest and the operation type showed the high demand in the order of consulting, education. The contents that they want to have consultation in nutrition dietary life education were diet therapy for diseases and the ordinary diet therapy for health. Conclusions: This study suggested the management of nutrition dietry life necessitates qualitative measures according to the different types of welfare facilities. For these, it is in need of development of counseling and education program included therapy for disease. Above all, the policy to secure dietitian of welfare facilities for the aged to perform these should be achived.

• Journal of The Korea Institute of Healthcare Architecture
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• v.16 no.1
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• pp.55-63
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• 2010

The study was initially designed to look into the soon-to-be senior citizens' preferences for the life after retirement in aging society. Its outcomes are to be contributed to grading up the quality of housing culture through examining the expected changes of housing types in the future. The increasing number of the soon-to-be senior citizens becomes leading subjects in information, culture and consumption areas. Therefore it is significant to present a model of housing types for those citizens by analyzing their preferred residence after retirement. To complete those objectives, a set of questionnaires concerning sex, age, district, education and income of those subjects in 40's-50's, who are expected to be more than 20 percent of national population by 2030, were collected and analyzed to find out their preferences over housing types, residential welfare facilities, and co-housing. The results show that the preferences over the residential welfare facilities and co-housing for those who are able to move for themselves are low, while the preferences over single-unit houses in the suburbs within 2 hours from a city are very high. Preferences for apartments in the urban areas are high for those with high income and education. In contrast preferences for life in their hometowns are high for those whose income and education are relatively low. Most of those with some difficulties in moving for themselves want to get help with welfare facilities for the elderly people. And the preferences of those who want to receive help from assistants are different from those preferring to get help from their offsprings, which tells a need for further study of the convertible housing types according to their family members.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Rural Architecture
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• v.23 no.1
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• pp.27-34
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• 2021

The senior welfare centers should provide integrated welfare services to the elderly whose needs are in change. So this paper tried to find a direction for improvement by identifying the spatial organization of the centers which are in Yeosu, Suncheon and Gwangyang. Classification of spaces of senior welfare center followed the guidelines 2020 for senior welfare center from Ministry of Health and Welfare which are consultation, medical rehabilitation, day or short-term protection, social education, home welfare, employment, welfare and public relations and PR planning and by adding management and public space. The above factors are invested and analyzed. The results of the survey and analysis of seven senior welfare centers are as follows. First, in the survey, the spatial organization of the senior welfare centers surveyed showed that the larger the size is, the dominantly lager the social education space is. Second, the space for day or short-term care, and employment is less than 1% of the total area, and most senior welfare centers do not have a basic space for this. Third, the space related to home welfare and counseling is very small, and more than half of the senior welfare centers do not have space related to it.

• Journal of Korean Public Health Nursing
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• v.34 no.3
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• pp.341-354
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• 2020

Purpose: This is a descriptive survey research study that identifies the intrapersonal, interpersonal, and organizational and community factors affecting the instrumental activities of daily living (IADL) in community-dwelling seniors. Methods: The study used data from a 2017 national survey of senior citizens, and includes 10,299 subjects aged 65 years or more. Complex sampling was performed to increase accuracy of the population, and hierarchical logistic regression was performed to identify the factors affecting IADL in seniors. Results: Amongst the organizational and community factors, we determined that the number of health centers, welfare facilities for senior citizens, hospital beds, and community sport facilities affected IADL in seniors, even after adjusting for intrapersonal and interpersonal factors. Conclusion: Helping seniors to maintain IADL independence for a longer duration is essential for their physical and social independence. Therefore, when establishing and developing policies for health promotion programs, efforts should be undertaken to actively reflect the level of IADL functions, and to create an accessible health and medical welfare environment by considering characteristics of senior citizens for operating programs.

• Korean Journal of Community Nutrition
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• v.22 no.3
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• pp.218-227
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• 2017

Objectives: The purpose of the study was to develop dietary change program items that could be used to improve dietary life of the elderly and investigate their validity. Methods: The survey was were analyzed by SPSS program (Ver. 21) and descriptive statistics was performed; a t-test, ${\chi}^2$ test, One-way ANOVA and Friedman test were used to determine the priority. Results: Programs for feeding senior citizens that need to be newly established are largely divided into two fields, namely, application of welfare facilities and application of home care, classified into large, medium and sub-classes. The large class was divided into nutrition management, sanitary control, and other health management. The medium class of nutrition management was divided into nutrition education, nutrition intervention, and menu management and supply. The sub-class was composed of division into application of welfare facilities for the elderly and application of home care for the same age group. Responses showed high rate saying that all the categorized items were necessary and valid. With respect to expectation effect on a community program for old people feeding, 'yes' was 65 people (55.6%) showing very high expectation toward the question whether a community program for old people feeding are newly set up. Conclusions: It is believed that nutrition for the aged will be improved and it will be a help not only to a small facilities without obligation of employing a dietician but also to the aged at home if a community program for old people feeding are newly established.

• Journal of Legislation Research
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• no.41
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• pp.87-123
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• 2011

Korea is expected to become an 'aged society' with more than 14 percent of the public aged 65 years or more by 2018. The rapid aging is giving rise to various problems within the society along with falling birthrate in a short period of time. In this context, the role and function of laws on welfare for the aged must be particularly emphasized. Also the Senior Citizens Welfare Act is of great importance as it provides social welfare service on the basis of functional connection with social insurance and public assistance. First, this paper looks into the history of laws related to welfare for the elderly such as the Senior Welfare Act, the Act on Long-term Care Insurance for Senior Citizens and the Basic Old Age Pension Act as well as the findings of earlier studies. In the second place, it will break down such laws by main components aiming to examine details of the laws and questions raised regarding them and to seek ways to achieve improvement with an emphasis on health care, old age income security, housing welfare(assisted living facilities), job security for the aged. The Senior Welfare Act offers substance of social welfare service for the elderly. Income security, health and medical care, welfare measures through long-term care and assisted living facilities, social participation by working are the key elements and all of them should be closely associated to ensure citizens get sufficient public support in their old age. For this purpose, the Senior Welfare Act is under a normative network with laws such as Act on Long-term Care Insurance for Senior Citizens and Basic Old Age Pension Act. Current laws on welfare for the aged including Senior Welfare Act are not sufficiently responsive to the aged society of the 21st century. Income security combined with decent social participation, health and medical care closely connected with long-term care system, efficient expense sharing between government and local government, enhancement of effectiveness of welfare measures can be considered as means to improve current welfare system so that the elderly can enjoy their old age with dignity and respect.

• Journal of Korean society of Dental Hygiene
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• v.12 no.5
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• pp.921-932
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• 2012

Objectives : The purpose of the this study was to obtain necessary source data for development of oral health improvement and promotion programs for the elderly by investigating the actual situations of oral health education related experience and needs that senior citizens had in Korea. Methods : In this study, convenience sampling was conducted in 430 senior citizens aged 65 years who lived in Seoul and Gyeonggi-do in Korea, for about six months from December 2011 to May 2012. For data collection, the structured questionnaire was used. Community-based senior citizens' welfare facilities and centres, as well as nearby churches were visited to inform them of the information on this study. Then, the senior citizens who agreed to participate in this study were given the questionnaire sheets. Excluding 33 copies of inadequately completed questionnaire sheets, 397 copies (92.3% of the entire collected data) were analyzed. Results : 1. In terms of the experience with oral health education, the number of elderly respondents who have not received oral health education was 202 (50.9%), whereas the number of those who have received oral health education was 195 (49.1%), which indicates that the latter shows a slightly higher proportion. 2. Examining the necessity for oral health education, the overall mean was 3.67 points based on 5 points as full marks, which suggests that senior citizens have high awareness of the necessity for oral health education. 3. Regarding the willingness to participate in oral health education, the number of those who answered that if any opportunity to receive oral health education is given, they would be willing to receive such the education was 211 (53.1%). Conclusions : Based upon the results mentioned above, we conclude that it is required to develop more systematic and sustained, life-long oral health education programs at the levels of senior citizen's welfare facilities and centres, in order to guide senior citizens to desirable oral health care practice.

• Architectural research
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• v.22 no.4
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• pp.123-133
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• 2020

Light is an essential environmental element for elderly people to do various activities. At senior welfare centers, healthy indoor lighting is especially necessary because the facilities are used by the elderly to perform their mostly indoor activities. The purpose of this study is to evaluate light environments at senior welfare centers for well-being lighting characteristics. We based the study on the 'Biophilia' theory, a concept related to health from happiness. Thus, this study is mainly based on literary review and survey research. For this, we conducted a location focused field study to identify the current state of the lighting environments at senior welfare centers in Busan, South Korea. First, we constructed structural questionnaire to evaluate lighting environment based on 'Light and Space' biophilia theory. Then, to survey subjective evaluation, the participant of research included total of 122 senior welfare center users. Based on the results of this research, the conclusions are as follows; 1) overall, it seems that the overall result of the light environmental evaluation seems to be high because the evaluated facilities in the case survey in large-scale were recently built elderly welfare centers. 2) most of the healing design elements are focused on the introduction of natural light and psychological influence. The satisfaction with actual natural light is evaluated to be high. Although shadow and reflected light are very important in discrimination and recognition of indoor space and wayfinding, the evaluation of reflected light and shadow was low for the study. 3) items that are related to the functionality of the light were highly evaluated, while the items that are related to the spatiality of the light were rated poorly. This study has its significance when examining the effects of light environments within the welfare center form of the perspective of senior citizens. It can be referenced when reconsidering the recognition of light environment as a major consideration factor to establish a desirable senior welfare center environment.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Rural Architecture
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• v.23 no.2
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• pp.17-24
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• 2021

Changes in the population structure caused by a decrease in the birthrate and an extension of life expectancy cause problems in utilization inefficiencies of closed schools and shortage welfare facilities for the aged. The closed schools have location characteristics that are close to the existing residence and facilities such as land and school buildings, so it is expected that the schools will be used as welfare facilities for the aged in the community. The purpose of this study is to compare and analyze the facility characteristics of closed schools in northern Gyeonggi-Do and present the types of aged welfare facilities that can be built, providing basic data for developing customized aged welfare facilities. The results of this study are summarized as follows: 1) The proportion of aged people in northern Gyeonggi-Do is higher than in southern Gyeonggi-Do, but welfare facilities for the aged are insufficient, so it is necessary to expand welfare facilities for the aged in northern Gyeonggi-Do. 2) Urban areas such as Paju and Goyang City have a lot of residential proximity, Dongducheon and Yangju have a lot of residential proximity, while schools located in urban and rural areas such as Yeoncheon have a lot of residential proximity. 3) Closed schools in urban areas such as Goyang City and Paju City are desirable to use them as residential facilities for senior citizens, day and night protection and short-term protection facilities, while closed schools in Namyangju City, Pocheon City, and Gapyeong County are desirable to use them as senior citizen centers and medical welfare facilities.