Self-Care and Relevant Factors Shaping Quality of Life among the Elderly with and Without Chronic Disease

Background: As world's population is growing, quality of life (QOL) and related factors such as self-care keep gaining mounting attention as they may affect the lives of the elderly significantly. The majority of the elderly people suffer from at least one chronic illness which plays an important role in elderly QOL. Objectives: This study was conducted to investigate self-care and related factors to QOL among elderly clients with and without chronic disease who are protected by healthcare centers in Karaj, Iran. Methods: In this cross-sectional study 400 elderly people were selected. A randomized multistage sampling method has been used. The data were collected using a standardized QOL and the Self-Care Assessment questionnaires. Pearson correlation was used to analyze the relationship between QOL and self-care factors.&nbsp; Additionally, Linear regression was run to identify the association between QOL domains and the independent variables through SPSS (p<0.05). Results: The average age of the participants was 69.25&plusmn;6.31. The majority of the participants were married and 48.5% were illiterate. The results related to the average dimensions of QOL were found to be as follows: physical health: 12.98&plusmn;4.36; psychological health: 12.81&plusmn;3.86; social relationship: 14.81&plusmn;25.25; environment: 12.83&plusmn;3.0; and total QOL: 19.33&plusmn;4.63. The results also revealed that QOL decreased significantly among the surveyed elderly, while it increased in the case of married and educated without chronic diseases.&nbsp; Finally, there was a significant positive relationship between all dimensions of SC (except for professional dimension) and dimensions of QOL (P<0.05). Conclusion: Chronic disease, physical SC, and emotional SC can act as significant predictors of QOL among the elderly.&nbsp; &nbsp;