Effects of health-related quality of life and long-term care insurance infrastructure on suicidal ideation among older Korean adults

ABSTRACT

This study examines the effects of health-related quality of life (HRQoL), long-term care insurance (LTCI) infrastructure, and the interactions between HRQoL and LTCI infrastructure on suicidal ideation (SI) in older Korean adults. This study used data collected from the 2017 Korea Community Health Survey (CHS) and administrative data. Multilevel logistic regression analysis revealed that higher HRQoL significantly lowered the risk of SI, but LTCI infrastructure was not strongly associated with the risk of SI. Furthermore, the interaction effect of HRQoL and LTCI infrastructure was significantly associated with SI. These results suggest that LTCI infrastructure helps to reduce the risk of SI among older adults.

KEYWORDS:

• Suicidal ideation
• health-related quality of life
• long-term care insurance infrastructure
• older adults
• multilevel analysis

Acknowledgments

The authors received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Changsook Lee

Changsook Lee is a doctoral candidate in the Department of Social Welfare at Seoul National University in South Korea. Her research interests include suicide of older people, dementia care, and advance care planning.

Sun-Young Heo

Sun-Young Heo, Ph.D. in social welfare at Seoul National University. She is a research fellow at the Chungbuk Research Institute in South Korea. Her research interest includes social relationships of older adults, and physical and mental health of older adults.