Self-care Behaviour of the Elderly with Heart Failure and its Associated Factors in Hospitals of Gonbad Kavus in 2018

Background :

Heart Failure is a common chronic disease and the cause of the elderly's mortality worldwide. It has imposed a high financial burden on health systems and families. Self-care is an important aspect of nursing and treating such patients. The aim of study was to determine the self-care behavior and its association with demographic and clinical factors in the elderly with heart failure.

Methods:

 The cross-sectional study was conducted on 120 elderly with heart failure, admitted to Cardiology Wards of Khatam Al-Anbia, Shohada, and Payambar Azam Hospitals of Gonbad Kavus County in 2018. The convenience sampling method was used to recruit participants. For data collection the Miller Self-care Behaviour Scale and the elderly's demographic information checklist were used. Data were presented in descriptive statistics, and analyzed using ANOVA, independent t-test and Spearman's correlation test in SPSS ver 16. The significant level was used p<0.05. 

Results:

 The self-care scores were 66.08±8.44 for HF elderly patients. The Self-care Behavior score were 68.25±1.01 and 64.12±0.7 in women and men respectively (p=0.004). There were no significant correlations between the elderly's scores of self-care with ejection fraction percentages and education levels.

 Conclusions: 

The mean scores of self-care in the elderly with HF were low. Therefore, the selfcare of the elderly with heart failure should be improved by training