Nursing Home Residents Aged over 80-A Cross-Sectional Analysis on Which Activity Traits Correlate to Positive Affect.

Melanie Zirves,Holger Pfaff

doi:10.3390/ijerph17249583

Abstract

Admission to a care facility is assumed to enhance depressive symptoms and dependent behavior in old age. In this context, the relevance of participation in activities that make everyday life in a care facility more pleasant has been pointed out. This study examines if there is a relationship between participation in different activities as well as the frequency of this participation and the positive affect of nursing home residents aged over 80. Data from the unique cross-sectional representative study ‘Quality of life and subjective well-being of the very old in North Rhine-Westphalia’ in Germany (n = 150, aged 90.15 years in average) were used. The data were collected between 08/2017 and 02/2018 using computer-assisted personal interviewing. The variability in and frequency of activity participation functioned as independent, and positive affect as dependent variable. Multiple regression analysis was performed. Residents’ predicted positive affect significantly increased with a higher variability in activity participation. There was no independent effect of frequency in participation. Our findings indicate that there is a significant and positive relationship between participating in a high number of different activities and the overall positive affect of residents aged over 80 years. This does not hold true for the frequency of participation.

Highlights

The growing number of the oldest population might lead to an increased demand for inpatient care in the future [1]
The objective of this study is to discover a potential relationship between the participation in activities and the frequency of this participation, related to the positive affect of nursing home residents aged over 80
The present study focuses on one component of depression symptoms, as we have found strong arguments in previous studies which suggest that it is worth analyzing positive affect as a specific domain of depressive symptomology

Summary

Introduction

The growing number of the oldest population (here defined as 80 years and over) might lead to an increased demand for inpatient care in the future [1]. Admission to a care facility is assumed to enhance depressive symptoms and dependent behavior in old age [2,3,4] Both the prognosticated increasing number of nursing home inhabitants and the shown influence on the psychological well-being when moving into a nursing home hold true for Germany [5,6]. One way to ease the process of adapting to a new living environment and to make everyday life in old age more pleasant is to participate in activities [1,7,8] This holds true for residents as has been shown by McGuinn and Mosher-Ashley [9] as well as Chao and Chen [10]. The relevance of activities that reduce stress, promote interest [11] and allow the experience of one’s own

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Discussion

Conclusion