Assessing quality of life of the elderly people in Khon Kaen Province

This thesis deals with the concept of quality of life of elderly people. This thesis portfolio consists of: (1) an essay on what is quality of life in elderly people and how it could be measured, (2) a data exercise on assessing quality of the elderly people in Thapra Village and describing the perspectives of health services providers related to activities that address quality of live of the elderly people in Khon Kaen, (3) a research proposal for assessing quality of the elderly people in Khon Kaen province, Thailand, (4) a portfolio presentation and (5) an annotated bibliography on the literature consulted related to quality of live and aging. Improving the quality of life is a way to maintaining independence, and preventing and delay disease of the people in later life. While, the elderly people become the majority of the population in the world. Successful improvements in health conditions together with a lower birthrate and a lower infant mortality result in a greater average life expectancy. QOL of the elderly people can describe the circumstances, responded to intrinsic characteristics of an individual and the extrinsic social, economic and environment factors that affect well being. To assess the QOL, one of instrument that become worldwide accepted is WHOQOL-BREF which is can be used in a variety of settings while allowing the results from different populations and countries to be compared. Because of QOL is the individual’s perception of their position in life. Therefore, in different situations, how elderly feel or perceive satisfaction may also change over time. Careful comparative studies in various countries would be necessary to examine the degree to which common definitions of contributing factors to QOL are cross applicable cultural. However, assessing quality of life help us to know the health needs, and the health problems of the elderly people in a variety of dimensions Assessing Quality of Life of the Elderly People in Thapra village and Health services activities affect the quality of life of the elderly people in Khon Kaen province. The objectives were (1) to describe the quality of life of the elderly people in Tha Pra Village, Khon Kaen province, (2) to identify the main factors that influence the quality of life of the elderly people in Tha Pra Village, Khon Kaen province into 4 domains; Physical health factors, Psychological factors, Social factors and Environment factors and (3) to explore health services providers’ perspectives on activities that address quality of life of the elderly people in Khon Kaen province. The data exercise was cross-sectional descriptive study design apply both quantitative method and qualitative method. WHOQOL-BREF was used for quantitative instrument and indepth interview quideline for qualitative instrument. The results indicated that the Thapra Village elderly people QOL the Physical domain score quite low. In addition, the highest proportions of factors that affect QOL were health problems, current illness, the old age (70-79) and higher education. For the qualitative data, Related to the aging policy in Khon Kean the Provincial Health Office act as a local MOPH to provide and implement policies. The community hospitals act as operational organizations. The findings from the data exercise confirm the problems described in the literature related to the elderly health. The data exercise on quality of life of the elderly people was important to gain experience with the instrument and the interview technique this will contribute to improving the survey on quality of life for elderly in Khon Kean province. Assessing the Quality of Life of the elderly people in Khon Kaen proposal was developed to describe the Quality of Life of the elderly people in Khon Kaen Province to inform decision making in term of policy, health promotion and social service. The specific objectives were to describe factors influence the quality of life of the elderly people Khon Kaen province into 4 domains; Physical health factors, Psychological factors, Social factors and Environment factors and to explore the perceptions of the elderly people on key factors affecting quality of life of the elderly people in Khon Kaen. This research proposal was designed as a cross sectional descriptive study applying quantitative and qualitative approaches. The tentative research plan was designed for 1 year and the budget requred were 70,000 baht. The expected outcome will provide as a useful recommendation for health policy, research and decision making on important aspect of health social services.