Self-rated health and reasons for ratings among Irish older adults

Abstract

Limited qualitative findings are available concerning the rationale given for rating one's health, particularly in an Irish context. We had the opportunity to investigate explanations given by older adults about their self-rated health, among a sample of 447 older adults. Qualitative interview data were gathered using a telephone assessment. Data were analysed using the thematic framework approach. Participants also rated their own health using a verbal rating scale, where 1 represents poor health and 10 represents optimal health. ‘Absence of disease’, ‘psychological functioning’, ‘specific troubles’, ‘age and physiology’, ‘health care utilisation’ and ‘mobility and functioning’ were found to be the main themes of explanation referred to by the sample. Five per cent of the sample were non-reflective about their self-rated health, and gave no reasons for their ratings. Typically, individuals with lower self-rated health tended to allude to specific troubles and mobility issues, while those with high self-r...