A Survey on the Health Status of Population with Disability in Goyang City

ABSTRACT

OBJECTIVE: To improve the quality of life of the disabled population by decreasing the incidence of complications and chronic diseases and improving self-care abilities according to individual diseases through health status evaluation and basic survey. METHOD: The basic clinical information of 1,378 regional severely-disabled patients were collected along with information regarding functional level, activities of daily living, nutritional status, and management of complications which were distinguished into 3 stages (good, moderate, poor), which were correlated into scores (1-3 points) that were used to assess a collaborative score (5-15 points) that represented their health status. Health behavior and blood tests were also done. RESULTS: Health status were evaluated based on sex, grade of disability, age, frequency of exercise and type of disability, which revealed that female sex, brain disorder, 1st grade disability, total lack of exercise, old age disabled patients were relatively poor in terms of health status. CONCLUSION: Health status of the severely-disabled showed differences according to sex, age, grade of disability, type of disability, and frequency of exercise, and health programs designed to screen and follow up the severely-disabled person with poor health status as well as manage their accompanying diseases and complications are needed.