PERSONAL DEFINITIONS OF HEALTH AMONG ELDERLY PEOPLE - A LINK TO EFFECTIVE HEALTH PROMOTION

Personal definitions of health are an Important link to effective heal th promotion, especially for elderly people. The degree to which indiv iduals find health care advice relevant is related to their definition s of health, yet few studies exist that invite older people to discuss such definitions in their own words. This descriptive qualitative stu dy used content analysis to examine 78 statements made in eight focus groups. These statements were in response to the question, ''What does 'healthy' mean to you?'' The 67 participants ranged in age from 67 to 91 years. Despite fairly similar backgrounds, participants used diffe rent personal definitions of health. Participants were most likely to rely on activity or attitude definitions of health. African Americans were more likely to discuss attitude definitions than white participan ts. Suggestions are made for improving the effectiveness of health pro motion programs on the basis of personal definitions of health.