Severity of urinary incontinence of nursing home residents correlates with malnutrition, dementia and loss of mobility.

Introduction: The prevalence of urinary incontinence increases with age. Especially in nursing homes people often do not only suffer from incontinence, in addition they present comorbidities, i.e.

Old and ill and still feeling well? Determinants of subjective well-being in >or=60 year olds: the role of the sense of coherence.

Objective: The authors investigated the determinants of subjective well-being in a sample of elderly by applying a salutogenetic model of subjective well-being in which sense of coherence (SOC) plays a central role. The hypothesis was that subjective evaluation and SOC as a personality resource explain more variance of subjective well-being than the objective changes resulting from the aging process.

Methods: A sample of >or=60-year-old patients of an internal hospital, previously examined between 1994 and 1997, were once more contacted between 2000 and 2002.

What influences self-perception of health in the elderly? The role of objective health condition, subjective well-being and sense of coherence.

The study examines in what way objective health-related variables interfere with psychic health and personality factors in explaining self-perception of health in the elderly. Two hundred and sixty-one patients aged 60 and older of an internal medicine hospital previously examined between 1994 and 1997 were once more contacted five years later. One hundred and sixty-four patients could not be included in the present investigation because of death, dementia, or severe physical illness.

Ageing styles: subjective well-being and somatic complaints in inpatients aged >/=60 years.

Background: Recent gerontological research shows a high variability in the elderly population. The aim of the present study is to investigate by means of cluster analysis, as to whether different 'ageing styles' can be identified in a sample of cognitively not impaired older persons, and to assess discrepancies between self-rated and expert-rated psychological and physical health.

Method: 243 patients aged 60 years and older in a general hospital were investigated using a clinical psychiatric interview, expert ratings, and self-report scales after extensive internal medical diagnostic evaluation.

Subjective body complaints as an indicator of somatization in elderly patients.

The authors examined the correlation of subjective body complaints (measured by the Giessen Subjective Complaints List) with sociodemographic data, objective health measures, measures of subjective well-being, and clinicians' ratings of somatization and psychological impairment in 251 cognitively unimpaired general hospital inpatients aged >/=60 years. The level of subjective body complaints correlated most highly with self-assessed life satisfaction and age-related changes and with the clinicians' rating of somatization. The results suggest that the level of subjective body complaints is determined by subjective well-being rather than by objective health measures, and thus subjective body complaints may be an indicator of somatization in elderly inpatients.