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Prevalence and related factors of successful aging among Chinese rural elders living in nursing homes

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Abstract

Few studies focus on the prevalence and related factors of successful aging (SA) among Chinese rural elders living in nursing homes. This study aims to make an operational definition of successful aging, estimate the prevalence of SA, and identify factors related to SA among Chinese rural elders living in nursing homes. Data for this cross-sectional study were collected by face-to-face interviews in five rural public nursing homes. A total of 205 elders aged 60 years and above were asked to answer a series of questions. Descriptive analysis, independent sample t tests, χ 2 tests, and multivariate logistic regression were used to show the prevalence and related factors of SA. The prevalence of SA in this population is 17.6% based on a multidimensional construct composed of: few chronic diseases, good cognitive and physical functioning, good mental health, and active social engagement. The logistic regression results indicate that successful agers are more likely to be younger, married, resilient, and better off economically, whereas gender, education, and social support are not related to SA independently. This model accounts for 45.8% of the variance in SA. These results suggest some tentative recommendations for elders, relevant decision-makers or employees in nursing homes, and administrative bodies. More rigorous longitudinal design is necessary to investigate the causality of the related factors and SA.

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Acknowledgements

This study has been approved by the SDU Human Research Protection Program. This work was supported by the Ministry of Education of China under Grant 14YJAZH068; Youth Team of Shandong University under Grant IFYT15008.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Nursing, Shandong University, Jinan, 250012, Shandong, China

    Menglian Wu, Yang Yang, Dan Zhang, Yaoyao Sun, Hui Xie, Jihui Jia & Yonggang Su

  2. School of Public Health, Shandong University, Jinan, 250012, Shandong, China

    Jie Zhang

  3. Department of Sociology, State University of New York Buffalo State, Buffalo, NY, USA

    Jie Zhang

  4. School of Foreign Languages and Literature, Shandong University, Jinan, 250100, Shandong, China

    Yonggang Su

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  1. Menglian Wu
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Correspondence to Yonggang Su.

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Responsible editor: D. J. H. Deeg.

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Wu, M., Yang, Y., Zhang, D. et al. Prevalence and related factors of successful aging among Chinese rural elders living in nursing homes. Eur J Ageing 14, 419–428 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10433-017-0423-6

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