Association of perceived life satisfaction with attitudes toward life-sustaining treatment among the elderly in South Korea: a cross-sectional study

Table 1 General characteristics of the study population

	Life satisfaction
	Total		Satisfied^a		Dissatisfied^b		P-value
	N	%	N	%	N	%	P-value
Characteristics	9916	100.0	5140	51.8	4776	48.2
Sex							< .0001
Men	3971	40.0	2208	43.0	1763	36.9
Women	5945	60.0	2932	57.0	3013	63.1
Age							< .0001
65 ~ 69	3509	35.4	2200	42.8	1309	27.4
70 ~ 74	2465	24.9	1283	25.0	1182	24.7
75 ~ 79	1956	19.7	877	17.1	1079	22.6
80 or over	1986	20.0	780	15.2	1206	25.3
Marital status							< .0001
Married	5849	59.0	3308	64.4	2541	53.2
Unmarried or Being separately	4067	41.0	1832	35.6	2235	46.8
Region							< .0001
Urban	4308	43.4	2346	45.6	1962	41.1
Rural	5608	56.6	2794	54.4	2814	58.9
Schooling years							< .0001
0 ~ 6	4429	44.7	1844	35.9	2585	54.1
7 ~ 12	4982	50.2	2917	56.8	2065	43.2
13 or over	505	5.1	379	7.4	126	2.6
Household income							< .0001
Tertile 1	3300	33.3	1482	28.8	1818	38.1
Tertile 2	3307	33.4	1666	32.4	1641	34.4
Tertile 3	3309	33.4	1992	38.8	1317	27.6
Smoking							0.478
Yes	1088	11.0	575	11.2	513	10.7
No	8828	89.0	4565	88.8	4263	89.3
Drinking							< .0001
Seldom	6760	68.2	3291	64.0	3469	72.6
Occasionally	2509	25.3	1515	29.5	994	20.8
Frequently	647	6.5	334	6.5	313	6.6
Physical exercise							< .0001
Yes	5186	52.3	2927	56.9	2259	47.3
No	4730	47.7	2213	43.1	2517	52.7
Big 5 chronic diseases^c							< .0001
Yes	3169	32.0	1364	26.5	1805	37.8
No	6747	68.0	3,776	73.5	2971	62.2
Subjective health status							< .0001
Good	4939	49.8	3316	64.5	1623	34.0
Bad	4977	50.2	1824	35.5	3153	66.0

^a Those who answered 1 to 3 points on a 5-point scale question, “How satisfied are you with your current life in general?”
^b Those who answered 4 to 5 points to the same question as above
^c Diabetes mellitus, cardiovascular disease, chronic respiratory disease, cancer, and stroke

ISSN: 1472-684X