Assess the effectiveness of activity intervention on mental health of older adults living in old age home, Chengalpattu

Elderly people need love, affection, care and recognition to foster their mental health. These aspects are deprived when they stay at old age home, which in-turn makes them prone to mental morbidity. Studies have proved that regular activities improve the emotional status of the individual. Hence this study aimed to assess the effectiveness of activity intervention on mental health of older adults living in old age home. The over all objective of the study was to find out the mental health of older adults before and after scheduled activity intervention. The conceptual framework adopted for this study was Modified Wiedenbach’s helping art of clinical nursing theory (1964). Randomly selected older adults (n= 60) mental health was assessed with Self Reporting Questionnaire before and scheduled activities were given for a period of four weeks for completion of the performance. After four weeks post-intervention mental health score was collected. The post intervention mental health score analysed by student paired ‘t’test revealed significant improvement (p= 0.001) in their mental health score. The percentage difference in mental health score of 48.7% with 98% confidence interval showed the effectiveness of activity intervention. The above findings reveled that activities are beneficial for improving mental health of the elderly