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The majority of older persons demonstrated an 'excellent' or 'very good' lifestyle with healthy habits. The adoption of healthy lifestyle patterns, in particular a regular balanced diet and proper physical activity, can help prevent functional limitations among the elderly in rural areas.

Health literacy (HL) is recognised as an important, modifiable factor in the self-management and health performance of elderly people. The aim of this preliminary study was to identify and analyse the level of health literacy among the elderly living in one of the eastern regions in Poland. The cross-sectional study was conducted among a convenience sample of 200 seniors aged 65+ after cognitive pre-screening with the use of the Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA) scale. To collect data, the Polish version of the HLS-EU-Q47 was used. More than half of the elderly surveyed presented problematic levels of general HL (GEN-HL), and also problematic levels of other dimensions: health care health literacy (HC-HL), disease prevention health literacy (DP-HL), and health promotion health literacy (HP-HL). The level of seniors’ HL is dependent on the level of their education, place of living, participation in activities run by Daily Center for the Elderly, and their self-assessment of health condition (p < 0.05). These results imply the important message that there is a need to create initiatives and programs improving health literacy targeted at seniors living in rural areas, those with lower levels of education, and those with poor access to activities organised by institutions supporting seniors.

Introduction: Defining the idea of health and placing it within a personal hierarchy of values is often the foundation of choice of behaviors that determine a lifestyle. Aim of the research: The main aim of this paper is to evaluate the significance of health in the hierarchy of nurses' personal values, including socio-demographic variables. Material and methods: A total of 191 nurses, who were students of bridging studies of the first and second cycles at the Faculty of Health Sciences, the Medical University of Lublin, Poland and at the University of Business and Enterprise in Ostrowiec-Świętokrzyski, Poland, were included in the analysis. The study was conducted in 2014 and 2015. A standardized research tool, the personal values list (PVL) of Z. Juczyński was applied. Results:The results of the study show that for the nurses, the most important aspects of happiness that define life satisfaction are "successful family life" (3.83 points), "good health" (3.55), and "favorite profession or work" (2.05). Personal values that are evaluated as highest by the respondents are "good health, physical, and mental fitness" (3.77 points), "love and friendship" (3.55) and, less commonly, "knowledge and wisdom" (1.75). The respondents of the eldest age group (above forty), had a tendency to value "good health, physical, and mental fitness" significantly higher in terms of personal value (p = 0.0007), in comparison with the respondents of the younger age groups, for whom "intelligence and mental acuity" is more important (p = 0.06). Conclusions: Health constitutes the highest value in the hierarchy of personal values indicated by the nurses and significantly conditions their satisfaction with life. Socio-demographic variables such as age, education, marital status, place of residence, and workplace influence the rank of health in the system of values for the surveyed nurses.

Introduction. Identification of the process of decision making by nurses is a basis for better preparation of future nurses to an independent, and at the same time, effective decision making. This is related with the provision of high quality nursing services. Aim. The objective of the presented study was identification of the decision making models applied by Polish nurses, and investigation of the relationship between specificity of work in individual wards and the applied model of decision making. Material and methods. The research instrument was the Finnish 56-item questionnaire form examining decision making by nurses. This questionnaire was translated and adjusted to the Polish conditions, and its psychometric properties were confirmed concerning validity and reliability. The study covered nurses employed in conservative treatment wards (n=977), surgical wards (n=361) and intensive care units (n=293); a total number of 1631 Polish nurses employed in the hospitals was examined. Results. Analysis of data showed that nurses from various wards in the study applied four models of decision making: analytical, intuitive, analytical-intuitive, and intuitive-analytical. Selection of the model used was associated with the specificity of work in individual wards. Conclusions. The studies confirmed that during the process of decision making the nurses used both analytical and intuitive approaches, according to the type of ward and the specificity of the work of a nurse.

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