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Stress, Depression and Health Risk Behaviors in Korean Elders
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Ae Jung Kim, Ok Soo Kim, Sung Hee Baik, Jong Hwa Jang, Jung Hee Kim
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J Korean Acad Community Health Nurs. 2007;18(3):391-399. Published online September 30, 2007
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 Abstract
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- PURPOSE
The purpose of this study was to investigate stress, depression and health risk behaviors in elderly people.
METHODS
The subjects were 238 Korean elders who had visited the convalescent center. The level of stress was measured by the Korean version of BEPSI, which was developed by Bae, Jeung & Yoo (1992) and modified by Yim et al.(1996). CES-D was used to measure the level of depression. For health risk behaviors, we measured cigarette consumption and alcohol drinking during the last one month.
RESULTS
Of the subjects, 17.4% were excessive drinkers and 18.9% were currently smokers. The level of stress was between moderate and high, and 62.7% of the subjects were depressed. There were significant differences in stress and depression according to economic status and self-reported health. In addition, depression had positive correlations with stress and QF score.
CONCLUSION
Stress and depression management programs for the elderly are needed. These findings indicate that nurses must consider stress and alcohol drinking when they take care of depressed elderly people.
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KACHN
