Health status and treatment seeking behavior of madhesi elderly: A study of elderly of Dhanusha District.

Thesis Report.

ABSTRACT: Ageing research is in infancy in Nepal. In my knowledge there is no study of Madheshi elderly in Nepal. The main objective of this study is to assess the over all health status and treatment seeking behavior of Madheshi elderly. This is a descriptive cross-sectional study. The study site was Ghodghans VDC of Dhanusha District. Total numbers of respondents were 120 elderly people of age 60 or above. The study design was descriptive cross sectional. The VDC was purposively selected, each household was selected as respondents by simple random technique. This study shows mean age of the respondents was 68.13 (SD =7.17) years. Majority of the respondents (61%) were male. This study found elderly were living with their at least on offspring. For most of the households the headship has been transferred to the younger generation whereas in some case the elderly people despite their disabilities are also heading the household. Only few of the respondents were active in income generating activities. And among them most were involve in agriculture. In this study there were 72 percent of respondents had disease. Major disease was joint pain, TB, stomach problem, diabetes, eye problem etc. As age increases the prevalence of disease also increases. Some of the respondents were also involved in healthy activities like yoga, exercise, and regular health check up. Most of the respondents were also regularly maintain their personal hygiene. The usually go to Zonal hospital, private clinics and health post for the treatment. Mostly their son and daughter in law take care of them. Only few of them were also abused by their family member. This study found majority of elderly were suffering from some types of diseases. The percentage of elderly male suffering from any types of disease was higher compared to women. More than fifty percent of the respondents were illiterate. Most of the respondents used to go zonal and private hospital/ clinics, the respondent. Most of the respondents were getting care by their son and daughter-in-law.

Eng.