Abstract
This study elucidates factors and weights (odds ratio) related to the awareness of bullying at geriatric hospitals and special senior-citizen care homes. It also obtains data of a high reliability in order to devise simpler forecasting factors for preventing bullying of senior citizens in so-called long-term care facilities.
The results show that the experienced awareness of bullying in geriatric hospitals was 3.0% and of being bullied was 19.0%. In special senior-citizen care homes, awareness of bullying was 15.3% and awareness of being bullied was 29.4%. In response to the question, “Who were you bullied by?”, the percentage of those who said they were bullied by patients was 53.3% at geriatric hospitals and 56.5% at special senior-citizen care homes. Those who said that the bullying was done by a care giver were 26.7% in the geriatric hospitals and 17.3% in the special senior-citizen care homes. In awareness other than that of bullying, the same trend was generally observed.
The analysis using a logistic regression model showed that the factors (odds ratio) having a meaningful effect on the awareness of being bullied in the geriatric hospitals were unyielding character (16.7) and a high value (3.9) on Zung's self-rating depression scale. In the special senior-citizen care homes, a high value (2.5) only in Zung's self-rating depression scale was observed. Consequently, depression is a related factor in the awareness of being bullied that is common to both the geriatric hospitals and the special senior-citizen care homes.
These results suggest a probability of predicting those who will be aware of being bullied, and a need for proper response to the problem of bullying in senior-citizens in long-term care facilities.
