| Summary: | 碩士 === 高雄醫學大學 === 高齡長期照護碩士學位學程 === 106 === Background: Early diagnosis and treatment in the early stages of symptoms can reduce the deterioration of diseases and prevent related complications. By conducting early screening and assessing care needs, people with such needs can be identified and necessary support and assistance can be provided. However, a precise definition and related research on people with high-concerned needs are lacking; thus, identifying older adults with high-concerned needs is of practical urgency .
Objectives: To investigate the prevalence of high-concerned older adults living in the community, understand the demographic characteristics of such older adults, and explore the differences in demographic characteristics between high-concerned and non high-concerned older adults.
Method: A cross-sectional descriptive study was adopted using a simple random sampling approach to select older adults aged ≥ 65 who had been living in the community for >3 months, and could communicate in Mandarin and Taiwanese. The prevalence of high-concerned older adults was then investigated using a developed preliminary screening scale for high-concerned older adults.
Results: A total of 818 community older adults were recruited, and the prevalence of high-concerned older adults according to assessment using the preliminary screening scale was 24.08%. High-concerned older adults were mostly women, primary school graduates, spouseless, not living alone, and Taoist. The average number of chronic diseases among them was 2.11 ±1.41, with the three primary chronic diseases being hypertension, heart disease, and diabetes mellitus. Further investigation of the demographic characteristics revealed that the proportion of high-concerned older adults who were aged ≥ 85 years old, men, spouseless, illiterate, nonreligious, living alone, and experiencing chronic disease was significantly higher than among non high-concerned older adults.
Discussion and conclusion: The high prevalence of community-living high-concerned older adults highlighted the importance of screening. If relevant education and training are provided to promote application of the developed preliminary screening scale, screening during care visits and consequent timely detection of high-concerned older adults will enable implementation of three-stage five-level secondary prevention while conforming to visions for community-centered elderly welfare.
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