A Survey of Earthquake Knowledge and Its Related Influencing Factors Analysis in Elderly Population

Objective To understand the levels of and influencing factors for knowledge of earthquake in the elderly population. Methods People who were older than 60 years in the earthquake area of Sichuan Province were surveyed by self-designed earthquake knowledge scale composed of 6 items with a point of 1-5 for each item between October and November 2013. h e total score ranged from 6 to 30 points. Results Up to 1 509 elderly people participated the survey. h e total score of earthquake knowledge was 13.33±4.85. h e main resource for acquiring those knowledge was TV(76.87%). Occupation, education level, residency, marital status, residence, self-injury, health status, access to earthquake knowledge, and worrying about earthquake were related factors for their knowledge on earthquake(P 0.05). Regression analysis showed that the higher degree of education, having a spouse, living in city, more access to earthquake knowledge, worrying about earthquake were the promotion factors for earthquake knowledge preparedness. Self-injury, poor health were the factors that hindered the acquiring of earthquake knowledge preparedness. Conclusion It is necessary to train knowledge of earthquake for elderly people individually because they lack enough resources and tend to be af ected by many factors.