The Association between Health Beliefs and Drug Use among the Elderly in Wiang Chai District, Chiang Rai Province

Abstract

Background: Health beliefs of a person’s influence their seeking for self-care, lifestyle, or health
behavior for each individual subordinate many factors.
Objective: To study personal factors and health belief patterns associated with drug use among the
elderly in Wiang Chai Sub-district, Wiang Chai District Chiang Rai
Methods: This cross-sectional study randomly selected the elderly sample group aged 60 years total
356 samples were selected from 923 elderlies based on the Taro Yamane sample size formula. Stratified
Random Sampling from 4 villages out of 12 villages in Wiang Chai district Chiang Rai province.The
data were statistically analyzed for percentage, standard deviation, while chi-square was analyzed for
inferential statistics to examine the correlation between the health beliefs model and binary logistic
regression for analysis demographic information and drug use among the elderly.
Results: The results showed that Elderly people had a score of health belief model at a very good level
of 191 people (50.8 percent), and use drug was a very good level of 341 people (90.7 percent). The
result found that association between the health belief model with drug use, age with drug use, status
with drug use, and comorbidity with drug use of the elderly were a statistically significant correlation
at the 0.05 level.
Conclusion: The results of this research can be applied for planning information and determining the
guidelines for the adjustment of the elderly’s drug use.