A Survey of Urban Middle-Aged Women's Transition

중년여성의 전환상태 실태조사

The purpose of this study was to identify transition conditions, health behavior and indicators of healthy transitions among middle-aged women based on Schumacher & Meleis(1994) transition model for developing intervention program for their health promotion. A convenience sample of 221 women aged 40-60 was obtained in Jung-Gu, Seoul and they were asked to complete the questionnaires, which consisted of modified health-promoting lifestyle profile(HPLP), knowledge of menopause, physical well-being, emotional well-being, modified women's role integration protocol (WRIP), Beck's Depression Inventory(BDI), and indicators of healthy transition with subcategories such as subjective well-being, role mastery and well-being of interrelationship. The results were as follows: 1. Women had a mean age of 47.53 years. More than half(53.39%) of the women had jobs and 88.69 % had their spouses, Of 221 women, 51.13 % were premenopausal, 19.91% were perimenopausal, and 28.96% were postmenopausal. 2. Women scored lower on health responsibility and exercise than on self actualization, nutrition and interpersonal support among subcategories of health behavior measured the modified HPLP. Only 11.98% of respondents had breast-self examination and 42.66% had pap smear for screening cancer. 3. In transition conditions, women had poor knowledge about menopause and median level of physical well-being, emotional well-being and stress. 15.45% of the women had clinical depression. 4. As for the outcome index of the transition model, the mean of indicators of healthy transition was 3.69(possible range 1-5). 5. The levels of education and economic and the menstrual status were significantly related to physical well-being, depression and stress in the categories of transition conditions. The total score of health behavior correlated negatively with depression. The total score of indicators of healthy transition correlated with physical well-being, emotional well-being, stress, and depression in the categories of transition conditions. In conclusion, these findings suggested a profile of fragile middle-aged women and contributed to developing the community-based intervention program for health promotion.