The Effect Of Health Education Among Middle-aged And Elderly In Urban Community In Jinan

BackgroundThe ageing process and proportion of elders in the world are increasing, and being a public problem among world health field. The serious aging problem will impact profoundly on China’s development of politics, economy and culture.When people aged50or over enter into the ageing society, due to their poor health status of body function, a variety of chronic diseases will occur. Psychological and social adaption ability will also abate. All these impact will affect their quality of life seriously, thereby increase the burden of the ageing society.Launching health education on middle aged and elderly can improve their health related knowledge level, build positive health attitude and form scientific health behavior. All these interventions are effective to cope with the serious ageing problem. Many related investigations have demonstrated that health knowledge is the base of positive attitude, while correct health attitude the motivation of changing bad lifestyle, and scientific behaviors are benefit to the consolidation of health knowledge and attitude. It is an effective measure to improve elders’health quality with knowledge generation and guidance.Objectives1. To understand the situation of middle aged and elders’health related knowledge, attitude and practice in urban city in Jinan.2. To launch comprehensive and multi-level health education, compare change of health KAP before and after the intervention and assess the effect of the intervention.Methods People aged50or over were selected as respondents with random cluster sampling and then assigned to intervention and control group by community. The situation of health KAP among participants in both intervention and control community were assessed. Unqualified questionnaire with too much missing data were eliminated. Epidata and SPSS were used to conduct double entry, data verification and data analysis with descriptive analysis, chi-square test, independent sample test and difference-in-difference model.Results1. Changes of health knowledge, attitude and practice before and after the intervention in intervention communities.After the health education, the general health knowledge, basic health knowledge and diabetes knowledge scores increased significantly, the changes of average scores before and after the education was with statistical significance (P<0.05); increase of knowledge of hypertension was not significant (P>0.05);After the health education, the average scores of health attitude increased significantly (P<0.05); the change of health behavior was not significant (P>0.05).2. Changes of health knowledge, attitude and practice in control communities.The changes of average scores for general health knowledge, knowledge of hypertension and diabetes knowledge were not significant (P>0.05). only the score of basic knowledge increased significantly (P<0.05); average scores of total health attitude decreased obviously (P<0.05); the average scores of total health practice did not change significantly (P>0.05).3. Comparison of changes in health knowledge, attitude and behavior scores across groups.The change of diabetes knowledge, general health knowledge and total health belief before and after education in intervention communities were higher than that of control communities (P<0.05). It showed that the health education to the middle aged and elderly significantly improved health knowledge and attitude, but not the case with health behavior.4. Analysis of intention to obtain health knowledgeMiddle aged and elderly intended to choose "one to one","exchange between peers" to obtain health knowledge. However, the majority of participants obtained health knowledge through television, broadcast and newspaper magazine in their real life, while the least obtaining from doctors;.5. Multiple linear regression and correlation analysis of health knowledge, attitude and practiceMarital status, education and age were significantly related to scores of health knowledge. Participants with marriage, high education and young age had higher health knowledge score. Female had higher score of health practice, but no relationship was identified between demographic characteristics and health attitude. Correlation analysis showed that scores of health knowledge, attitude and practice were positively correlated.Conclusions1. The current situation of health KAP among middle aged and elderly is not optimistic; people have unreasonable dietary behavior and bad lifestyle.2. Multi-level health education can effectively improve level of health knowledge and attitude among middle aged and elderly in urban city, but the effect for health behavior were not significant. There is a need to change dietary and lifestyle, and education among this population should be implemented for long time.3. Demographic characteristics have influences on health education and behavior, so it is essential to launch different education on people with different characteristic.4. Health knowledge, attitude and practice are inter-correlated:knowledge is the base of positive attitude, correct attitude is an effective motivation to change bad lifestyle, and scientific practice is benefit to the consolidation of health knowledge and attitude.