Abstract
Background: Increasing attention has been paid to the therapeutic effect of garden in long-term care home. However, problems on set up and reliability of implementation were still of concern in studies. Virtual Zen garden is an innovative intervention that transfers the beneficial effect of garden into long-term care home.
Objectives: To examine the effect of virtual Zen garden on quality of life and affect of long-term care home residents in Hong Kong.
Methods: A single blinded randomized controlled trial with repeated measure and convergent mixed methods design was adopted. Participants were randomly allocated to received virtual Zen garden intervention(IG) or activity control(CG). Each participant received bi-weekly session for 3 months. Quality of life and affect before(T0), after(T1) and 3-month post-intervention(T2) were measured. Semi-structured interview were conducted to explore the experience of participants in virtual Zen garden.
Results: Significant interaction effect in quality of life (F = 17.806, p < 0.001), depression (F = 12.684, p < 0.001), anxiety (F = 15.909, p < 0.001), pain (F = 10.640, p < 0.001) and neuropsychiatric symptoms (F = 20.795, p < 0.001). Significant differences in post hoc analysis were only found in IG instead of CG. The improvement in quality of life and affect in IG sustained for 3 months after intervention. Four themes were drawn from thematic analysis, including influence of virtual Zen garden on (1) physical health; (2) psychological health; (3) social relationship; and (4) environment.
Author Information
Ivo Yuen, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong SAR
Timothy Kwok, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong SAR
Paper Information
Conference: EGen2024
Stream: Lifespan Health Promotion
This paper is part of the EGen2024 Conference Proceedings (View)
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To cite this article:
Yuen I., & Kwok T. (2024) The Effect of Virtual Zen Garden on Quality of Life and Affect of Residents in Long-Term Care Home ISSN: 2435-4937 The European Conference on Aging & Gerontology 2024: Official Conference Proceedings (pp. 51-58) https://doi.org/10.22492/issn.2435-4937.2024.5
To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.22492/issn.2435-4937.2024.5
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