Characteristics of Elderly People Participating in Long-Term Care Prevention Project Based on Relationship Between Participation in Community Activities and Self-Rated Health

Abstract

Objective: To examine the characteristics of elderly people who participated in care prevention projects, using a combination of the self-rated health and the status of participation in community activities by the frequency of participation and the number of types. Methods: We conducted a self-administered questionnaire survey for participants in long-term care prevention in Higashimurayama city, Tokyo, from June to December 2018. One hundred fifty-three elderly people completed the questionnaire. We asked about their status of participation in community activities, self-rated health, the number of types of social support, and satisfaction with social support, demographics, and self-efficacy of community activities. We examined the characteristics of participants for each combination of the status of participation in community activities and self-rated health using the chi-squared test and the Kruskal-Wallis test. Results: There were 106 (69.3%) participants in the high participation and healthy group. Many people in the low participation and healthy group (n = 28, 18.3%) lived alone (p = 0.024). This group had a smaller number of types of social support than the high participation and healthy group (p < 0.001), but there was no significant difference in their satisfaction. The high participation and unhealthy group (n = 9, 5.9%) had lower self-efficacy than the high participation and healthy group (p = 0.001). Conclusions: Those who more participated in community activities had higher self-rated health, but some of those who less participated also had high self-rated health. The characteristics differed depending on the combination of participation in community activities and self-rated health.