Self-rated health and its influencing factors among left-behind elderly in Qiannan rural minority arears of Guizhou province

  Objective  To examine the status and influencing factors of self-rated health among left-behind elderly in rural minority areas of southern Guizhou province (Qiannan) and to provide references for improving health condition of the elderly.

  Methods  Using stratified random cluster sampling, we selected 1 260 rural residents ≥ 60 years old and being left-behind at least 6 months due to their children’s migration for working in Qiannan rural minority areas; then we conducted a questionnaire survey in the residents between December 2015 and March 2016.

  Results  Of the participants, 318 (25.24%), 592 (46.98%), and 350 (27.78%) reported good, fair, and poor health, respectively. The results of ordinal logistic regression analysis demonstrated that the participants of female gender, with chronic disease, and with impaired activities of daily living (ADL) were more likely to report poor health; whereas, those with monthly family income of 1 000 RMB Yuan or more, participating in health education programs during previous one year, and without inconvenience when seeing a doctor were more likely to report good health.

  Conclusion  The self-rated health is relatively poor and mainly influenced by gender, familial economic condition, whether suffering chronic disease, whether having impaired ADL, whether receiving health education during previous one year, and whether being convenient to see a doctor among the left-behind elderly in Qiannan rural minority areas.