Development and Effects of a Community-Based Death Education Program for Older Adults

ABSTRACT

Purpose@#This study was conducted to investigate the effects of a community-based death education program for older adults. @*Methods@#The study was conducted as a quasi-experimental study with a non-equivalent control group and pretest-posttest design. The subjects were community elders aged over 65 registered at a community health center and were convenience sampled. The experimental group consisted of 33 participants and the control group consisted of 32 participants. Experiments are conducted from June 18 to July 24, 2020. We tested our hypothesis using an independent t-test, and paired t-test. @*Results@#The experimental group had significantly higher scores for psychological well-being than the control group after treatment (t=2.24, p=.028). In general attitude toward the use of life-sustaining technology, however, only the experimental group had a significant difference before and after the experiment with lower scores compared to the control group (t=-5.41, p<.001). @*Conclusion@#We found that the community-based death education program developed in this study was partially effective in improving older adults’ psychological well-being and general attitude toward the use of life-sustaining technology.