Attitudes toward successful aging in individuals with chronic disease aged 65 or over

Aylin Aydın Sayılan,Aykut Aydın

doi:10.23950/jcmk/9736

Abstract

Aim: To determine the relationship between attitudes toward aging and old age, and successful aging in individuals with chronic disease aged 65 or over. Methods: The Attitude Scale toward Aging and Elderliness and the Successful Aging Scale were employed in this descriptive, cross-sectional, comparative study. Data were expressed as frequency, percentage, mean, and standard deviation and were analyzed using the Kolmogorov-Smirnov test, the t test, One-Way ANOVA, and Pearson correlation analysis. p values <0.05 were regarded as significant. Results: Individuals with chronic disease had greater difficulty in accepting old age, greater social exhaustion, greater abilities to cope with problems, and higher successful aging scores. Conclusion: This study shows that despite their negative attitudes toward old age, individuals with chronic disease had greater abilities to cope with problems and aged more successfully.

Highlights

Old age is one of the turning points in an individual’s life, and one that entails physical, social, psychological, and mental adaptation problems [1].Every stage in old age, the last of the developmental periods, is affected by the positive or negative aspects of the previous stage
88.1% of the participants were married, 46.3% were educated to primary school level, 63.7 were of average economic status, 78.8% were retired, 67.8% lived in a nuclear family, and 64.4% had at least one chronic disease
In terms of total Successful Aging Scale and subscale scores, the mean Coping with Problems score was 19.53±6.85, the mean Healthy Aging score was 8.33±3.86, and the mean total scale score was 27.86±9.81 (Table 1)

Summary

Introduction

Old age is one of the turning points in an individual’s life, and one that entails physical, social, psychological, and mental adaptation problems [1].Every stage in old age, the last of the developmental periods, is affected by the positive or negative aspects of the previous stage. Coping with one or more chronic diseases has a particular impact on the individual’s attitude to age and aging [2]. The increase in the elderly population has led to greater awareness of old age. Both birth and death rates are falling in many parts of the world [4]. Positive attitudes are reflected in the elderly individual’s quality of life and physical and psychological well-being. Increased awareness of aging in recent years has given rise to the concept of successful aging. This involves a healthy lifestyle and the ability to cope with problems [6,7]

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Conclusion