The purpose of this study is to find the Korean women's view to pregnancy within the Korean cultural context, to help nurses understand psychosocioemotional schema of the pregnant women, and to contribute to theory- building on the meaning of pregnancy. The interviewees were 21 women in their twenties or thirties and they were selected by theoretical sampling technique. Thirteen women of the interviewees were single and others married. Data were collected by in-depth interviews from September November in 1994. Interviews were tape-recorded and transcribed. Data were analyzed by Van Kaam's phenomenological method. Results were as follows. Eighty two descriptive expression were found and they were grouped under fourteen common factors. These are [to maintain family],[instinct][obli-gation],[what one should do],[to make home],[to tie couple firmly],[means to overcome a period of lassitude], [token of love],[hope], [to avoid loneli-ness], [wanted to have a baby],[to provide for old ages], [to be a mother], [to achieve her desire through baby]. Finally, fourteen common factors were grouped under four higher categories. Five common factors, [to maintain family],[instinct],[obligation],[what one should do],[to make home] were grouped under (custom). Three factors,[to tie couple firmly],[means to overcome a period of lassitude], [token of love] were grouped under (love between couple). Four factors,[hope],[to avoid loneliness], [wanted to have a baby],[to provide for old ages] were grouped under (pursuiting safety). Two factors, [to be a mother], [to achieve her desire through baby] were grouped under (self fulfillment). At present, the most distinguishing motivation of childbearing was rooted in the cultural custom. Kortean women thought that it was their duties to have children and children were necessary in life. But they were beginning to recognize that baby could tie couple more firmly and get rid of their loneliness. Korean women no longer considered their children as the one who would take care of them when they were old or who would satisfy their unmet needs. As pregnancy is not women's duty only, authors recommend further studies on men's view to pregnancy.

The clinical practice program for home care nurses was implemented in June 1994, to help to set up a hospital-based home care system in the Kwangju City area as a collaborative work between the Department of Orthopedic Surgery at Chunnam University Hospital and Chunnam University School of Nursing. Under the developed clinical practice strategy, the eight week training was given to five licensed home care nurses who had completed Part I and II of the home health care nursing practicum from June 1994. The purpose of this descriptive evaluation study was to identify the effectiveness of the clinical practice program for home care nurses specialized in the area of patient care for people with musculoskeletal function impairment. As a method in data analysis, data triangulation was used in the five home care nurse case evaluations. The variety of data analyzed included confidence score by home care nurse self-evaluation, patient and family member satisfaction scores, and competency score by preceptor evaluation. The study findings revealed that an increase rate in nursing performance didrate necessarily coincide with an increase not in competency score and also, not with the patient/family member satisfaction scores. And an order derived from the clinical performance scores of five home care nurses corresponded to those from three measurements-competency score, patient satisfaction score, and family member satisfaction score. However, it differed from the order associated with the confidence score. Consistency derived from the three objective evaluation methods may lead to the possibility that the level of competency measured by educator can be further explained by the levels of patient/family member satisfaction. The salient finding of this study was that, in case of nurse A who had had little clinical experience in the orthopedic patient care, there was a significant increase in the level of confidence and competency in subscale of professional skill with the home care clinical practice. Therefore, the effect of the clinical practice program would be successful for nurses who have had little experience in the area of specialization. The study results suggest that there might be some time difference in the development of cognitive sense (confidence) in performance and actual clinical performance (competency). In future research, relationships between the confidence and competency score, and between the confidence score and the patient satisfaction score should to be measured in different time frame to achieve a better explanation power of the study outcome.

Given the global impact of the AIDS pandemic, it is necessary to take every measure to prevent an epidemic of this disease in Korea. The only available strategy is prevention. Considering college students as a potential risk group, this study examined their knowledge of, and attitudes toward AIDS. In this study, 399 students from three colleges in Pusan and Uoolsan were examined for their attitudes to, and knowledge of AIDS. Findings indicate that the majority of the students(90%) had basic knowledge on the transmission and the prevention of the disease. However, most of them, including nursing students, lacked knowledge as to the etiological agent, major symptoms and available diagnostic techniques. To the questions designed to examine social attitude towards AIDS patients, the students showed a tendency to view AIDS patients as responsible for their own illness. Interestingly, they showed sympathy to their imaginary friends and relatives suffering from AIDS. The study findings suggest a need for the development of AIDS educational programs for college students.

This descriptive study was done to investigate the critical thinking ability of senior nursing students in two types of nursing education programs: associate and baccalaureate programs. Data were convenently collected from 159 associate degree nursing(ADN)students and 158 baccalaureate degree nursing(BSN)students. All schools were the Ministry of Education accredited and located in Seoul City and Kyung gi Province. These data were collected by self reporting questionaire given over two months from March to May, 1995. The subjcets completed the Watson -Glaser Critical Thinking Appraisal (WGCTA)and a demographic questionnaire. The data was analyzed using descriptive statistics and t-test with the SAS program. The results of this study are as follows 1. The mean of critical thinking ability of the ADN students was 42.69. 2. The mean of critical thinking ability of the BSN students was 47.68. 3. There was significant difference in the WGCTA scores between the ADN and the BSN students (t=7.38 p<0.001) 4. This study suggests that critical thinking ability may increase with higher levels of nursing education. Possible explanations for these findings are discussed.

The Purpose of this study was to identify characteristics of fatigue and the relationship between fatigue and related factors in patients on hemodialysis. This study was a survey study using a cross-sectional design. The subjects for this study were 101 patients on hemodialysis who were registered in the six hemodialysis clinics among a total of eleven clinics in Seoul. The period of data collection was from February 28, 1995 to May 2, 1995. Data were collected through an interview with a structured packet and the physiological data. The tools used in this study were the Visual Analogue Scale-Fatigue developed by Lee et al(1990) and translated by Lee (1991), the fatigue interview schedule developed by this reseacher, Zung's self rating depression scale (Zung, 1965), the self-efficacy scale developed by Sherer et al(1982) and the Norbeck Social Support Questionnaire (NSSQ) translated by Oh (1984). The collected data were analyzed using descriptive statistics (mean, standard deviation, frequency, range), Pearson correlation coefficients and Stepwise multiple regression. The results were as follows: 1. Characteristics of Fatigue of hemodialysis patients: 1) 79 of 101 hemodialysis patients complained fatigue. 2) The mean fatigue score as measured by the VAS-F was 36.2mm. 3) The mean duration of fatigue was 2.9 hours 2. Characteristics of fatigue related factors: 1) The physiologic factor which included Hgb, Hct, BUN, creatinine, potassium and inter-dialytic weight gain deviated from normal range. 2) The psychological factor which included depression and self-efficacy was about the same level as for patients with other chronic diseases. 3) The environmental factor which included social support had wide variation. 3. The relationship between fatigue and related factors: 1) Interdialytic weight gain in the physiological factor was the only valuable with fatigue (p<.05) 2) The relationship between fatigue and the psychological factor of depression showed a positive and strong correlation (p<.05). According to the findings of this study, fatigue was highly correlated with the depression, This indicates that nurses should try to assess and control psychological factors when patients complain of fatigue rather than just considering physiological factors. Nursing has to develop effective nursing interventions to reduce fatigue in patients with chronic diseases using the relationship between fatigue and physiological, psychological and environmental factors.

This study aimed to analyse the test contents of the national examination for the registered nurses (NERN) over 3 years from 1991 to 1993 in Korea. In recent years in Korea, the MCQ(multiple choice question) has been showing to be a highly recognized method for assessing the qualification of registered nurses. Unfortunately, nursing faculties have found NERN had some bad MCQs through having evaluation workshop for Some MCQs often provide so many unwriting clues which become a bias of the results, and some items fell into the category of the lower level of educational taxonomy such as isolated recall a fact or data. Frequently the stems of the questions are ambigous, unclear, disputable, esoterical or trivial. Considering those fallacies of the national examination, it is very critical to review the test items to see whether it is of high quality, is more fair, reliable and objective in depth. Therefore, this study was done to provide data for the improvement of the test contents as well as the teachers's assessment skill. For this study, the ad hoc committe was composed of 16 members, including 5 education board members of Korean Academic Nurses Association and 11 nursing faculty members. This committe had one day panal discussion and filled the checklist for this study. The porcess of analysing data was held over 10 times during 1992-1994. The analysis focussed on educational taxonomy such as cognitive domain(kowledge), psychmotor domain (skill), affective domain(attitude) and the level of learning such as recall, understanding, problems solving, and learning area of theory and practice, and the learning content categorised by nursing process and disease process. The test analysed using difficulty index and the structure of the test items was analysed. The conclusions and suggestion as follows: 1. In learning area, the average ratio of the theory and practice was 1: 1.1 which was less than 1: 2 suggested by Korean National Health Institute, and the ratio was differnt by the 8 learing sujects of nursing. 2. In category of the educational taxonomy, the knowledge domain was emphasized mostly(79. 7%), the skill domain was 14.9%, and the attitude domain was 5.4% only. 3. In the level of learning, generally, the test items of the level of recall(45.5%) and the understanding (46.3%) were covered almost and the problem solving was 8.1%. 4. In the learning contents, generally, the test items related to nursing process was 67.2% and that of disease process was 32.8%. However, this proportion was different by the 8 leaning subjects. Even though the nursing diagnosis has been emphasized in nursing curricula recently, the test items of this was identified very few. 5. In the structure of the test item, some were not clear, incorrect grammar, unclear description and some have clues to answer. 6. In the item analysis, the non-acceptable level of the difficulty indes(means too easy) was 65.7%, and the acceptable level was 33.9%. Considering the reseults we would like to suggest the followings, 1. Since the test items of knowledge domain was dominant, the test items of the practice domain and attitude domain should be emphasized more. 2. The regular review and analysis of NERN should be arranged in order to improve the quality of the test items which will give influence to the nursing education positively.

Nursing literature suggests that the self-concept of nurses gives an important implications to educators and administrators as well as clinicians for their professional development. With a view to ex ploring how nurses view themselves, the Professional Self-Concept of Nurses Instrument (PSCNI) using 27 Likert items was developed by Arthur in Australia in 1990. This study is an extension of the PSCNI using Korean samples with some modifications. A convenience sample was drawn from 800 nurses working in three university hospitals in Seoul; three university hospitals in Kyonggi-do and a university hospital and a psychiatric hospital in Kangwon-do. Seven hundred questionnaires were analyzed using the statistical analysis system(SAS). The reliability of the scale was tested by test-retest and Cronbach's alpha. Differences in the PSCNI, which are closely related to demographic variables, were examined by t-test, ANOVA and the Duncan's multiple range test. Factor analysis was employed so as to examine component factors. The results are summarized as follows: 1. The test-retest reliability of the PSCNI was .79 and Cronbach's alpha was .85. Item correlations with total revealed consistent correlations and subscale reliability varied from .49 to .85. 2. The average score of PSCNI was 75.21 and average item score was 2.79. 3. Twenty four items were derived from the PSCNI 27 items and these items clustered in three component factors. The cumulative percent of variance was 38.12% and for factor 1 was 22.81%, for factor 2, 9.79% and for factor 3, 5.51% respectively. 4. A comparison of the scores for the dimensions of the PSCNI shows a relative difference in terms of mean item scores and in decending order, professional practice (m=2.83), communication (m=2.82) and satisfaction (m=2.70). 5. Professional self-concept of nurses was found to vary significantly according to age(P=.0001), re-ligion (P=,0001), academic background(P= .0109), marital status (P=. 0001), career (P= . 0001) and position (P=. 0001). In conclusion, there was a correlation between professional self-concept of nurses, and life and work variables. This study provides an important message for administrators and nurse educators by highlighting factors which can be addressed by education programs, staff development and appraisal. While the test results largely confirm the Australian and Canadian tests, further research is necessary to improve the cumulative percent of variance instead of applying Arthur's PSCNI directly to Korean nurses.

The Purpose of this study was to build a substan tive theory about the experience of postpartum depression. The qualitative research method used was grounded theory. The interviewees were eight mothers who had experienced postpartum depression. The data were collected through in-depth interviews with audiotape recording done by the investigator over a period of twelve months. The data were analyzed simultaniously by a constant comparative method in which new data were continuously coded into categories and properties according to Strauss and Corbin's methodology. Analysis the grounded data resulted in 28 concepts being identified. Eight categories emerged from the analysis. The categories were regret, loss of freedom, isolation of oneself, heartache, loss, emotional upset, avoidance, recovery. These substantive categories are consistant with preious research results. Causal conditions included: regret, loss of freedom. Phenomena: heartache, loss, emotional upset. Context: isolation oneself. Intervention condition: avoidance. Action/interaction strategies: desire for recovery. Consequences: recovery. These categories were synthesized into the core concept-The process of filling the empty loss of self The process of the experienced postpartum depression was (1) change after delivery, (2) searching for a reason for depression, (3) effort to recover from postpartum depression, (4) recovery from postpartum depression and return to previous life. The process of recovery from postpartum depression was proceeded by (1) support from others, especially husband, (2) resolution of stressful life events, (3) reconstructing of life goals and resolution strategies, (4) acceptance of depression and seeking psychiatric treatment. Seven hypotheses were derived from the analysis. (1) Mothers who experienced stressful life event and economic problem are more depressive. (2) Mothers who have conflict with parents are more depressive. (3) The more somatic symptoms, the more depression. (4) Social support faciliates recovery from postpartum depression. (5) Mothers who have lower self-esteem are more depressive. (6) Mother's role overload disturbs recovery from postpartum depression. (7) Ideal maternal identity faciliates recovery from postpartum depression. Through this substantive theory, nurses can understand the importance of postpartum depression management.

This study was designed to identify the relationship of perceived self-efficacy and sick-role behavioral compliance in diabetic children. The forty-two diabetic children participating in this study were selected from outpatients. The period of data collection was August 8 to December 9, 1994. Collected data were analyzed by means of chi-square test, t-test, Pearson correlation using SPSS/PC+. The result are summarized as follows: 1. The mean score of perceived self-efficacy was 3. 21 that of sick-role behavioral compliance 3.17. 2. Perceived self-efficacy and sick-role behavioral compliance had a positive correlation which was statistically significant (r=0.77, P<0.001). 3. There were statistically significant difference in perceived self-efficacy according to age(p<0. 01) and acknowledgment of prescribed calories in the diabetic diet (p<0.001). 4. There were statistically significant difference in sick-role behavioral compliance according to age(p<0.01) and acknowledgment of prescribed calories in the diabetic diet (p<0.001). These results suggest that perceived self-efficacy is an important variable in the compliance of diabetic children. Nursing intervention needs to be directed at promoting perceived self-efficacy to maintain sick ?role behavioral compliance for diabetic children. Therefore programs of nursing intervention should be revised in order to promote perceived self ?efficacy in diabetic children.

Although sensory deficits caused by stroke have been occasionally reported, dysfunctions of discriminative sensation have seldom been studied in patients with strokes. With the use of specifically designed methods, discriminative sensations including texture discrimination and position sense were tested in 67 patients with acute unilateral stroke. Thirty-two age and sex-matched healthy subjects were used as controls. Impaired discriminative sensation was common in patients with unilateral stroke (detected in 57 out of the 67 patients) regardless of the lesion location except for patients with lateral medullary stroke. Proprioceptive discriminative sensation remained intact in all except for three out of 25 patients who were initially diagnosed as having pure motor stroke on the bases of conventional sensory tests. However, tactile discriminative sensation remained intact in only 17 out of 25 patients. Discriminative sensory disturbances are common in patients with unilateral stroke even in those with intact sensory function on routine examination. The subtle disturbances of this sensation may explain, at least in part, the clumsiness of the patients that is not readily explained by conventional neurological tests.

The effect of circumvaginal muscle (CVM) exercises to improve sexual function in married women has not been investigated by currently acceptable research methods, nor have appropriate instruments and techniques to carry out such investigation been available. The purpose of this research was to study the effect of CVM exercise on sexual function, and of measuring CVM function after CVM exercises. The research tools used were a modified Derogatis Sexual Function Inventory questionnare and a pressure sensitive intravaginal balloon device. This research was conducted in Kwangju-city and Chonnam province, Korea from July, 1994 to July, 1995. The research used a non-equivalent control pre-post test quasi-experimental design. Forty-five healthy married female volunteers, aged 30?8, and were randomly assigned by age using the matching fixed-length blocks to two groups. The experimental group consisted of 21 women who were assigned a 25 -minute per day CVM home exercise program for six weeks. The control group of 24 women did not do the CVM home exercises. The CVM home exercise was developed by Dougherty (1989a) and adopted to Korea by Lee (1993). Data were analyzed by x2-test, Paired t-test, Spearman product-moment correlation using SAS/PC+. The results are summarized as follows: 1. There were no significant differences in the characteristics of the subjects between the exper imental and control groups before the CVM home exercises. 2. Hypothesis 1 that married women who participated in CVM home exercises would have higher mean scores on the sexual function (SF) than in those who did not participate in home exercise was supported. 3. Hypothesis 2 that married women who participated in CVM home exercises would have higher vaginal pressure on SF than in those who did not participate in home exercises was supported (mean maximum pressure, t= -7.338, P<.0001, peak maximum pressure, t=-11.164, P<.0001). 4. Hypothesis 3 that the more often (number of days) and the more frequent (numbers of times per day) that married women do CVM home exercise, the higher their mean scores on SF and vaginal pressures was supported (r =0.233, P<.01; r=0.352, P<.05). A six week CVM home exercise program using a tape recording showed that SF can be improved. Results of this study showed that married women who exercise on a regular basis for six weeks improve their sexual function and increase the mean vaginal pressure and peak maximum pressure (tested by electronic monitor). In conclusion, CVM exercise is effective in increasing SF.

The purpose of this study was to contribute to family nursing in the areas of reducing stress and improving coping for parents of mentally retarded children. Data were collected through self-report questionnaires during a period of 2 months between November 1994 and January 1995 in the Kyoung-in area. The subjects consist of 176 parents (88 mothers and 88 fathers) of mentally retarded children attending schools for the handicapped. The levels of general stress and of parental role stress were measured with the General stress scale and the Parental role stress scale, respectively. The coping scale developed by Folkman and Lazarus was adopted to measure the level of coping, and the patterns of adaptation scale developed by Damrosch and Perry was adopted to measure the patterns of adaptation. The data were analyzed by a SAS program using Fisher's exact test, paired t-test, and oneway ANOVA. The results are as follows: 1. The level of general stress was significantly higher in mothers than in fathers. Mothers experienced a significantly greater level of parental role stress than fathers did. No significant difference in the level of coping was observed between mothers and fathers. There were differences in maternal and paternal patterns of adaptation. 2. The adaptation pattern of fathers was different according to their level of general stress, parental role stress and coping. The adaptation pattern of mothers was not different according to their level of general stress and parental role stress, but was according to their level of coping. 3. General stress experienced by fathers was different according to education, health status and support from their spouses. Satisfaction with family life, satisfaction with spouse and the support from spouse influenced coping used by fathers. Their level of parental role stress was not associated with any of their general characteristics. 4. In mothers, the level of general stress was different according to their health status, the level of parental role stress was related to satisfaction with family life and satisfaction with spouse. Their level of coping was associated with the support from spouse. The above findings indicate that mothers did not have more coping strategies than fathers did, despite the results which showed that mothers experienced greater stress than fathers did. Especially, the adaptation pattern of mothers was different according to their level of coping. Hence, nursing interventions directed at managing stress and improving coping should be used with mothers who use adaptation pattern 1. In particular, fathers should actively participate in parenting, and support their spouses.

For the purpose of integrating nursing diagnosis into the nursing curriculum, a descriptive survey re search was done using the inductive method with questionnaires and a literature review. Research subjects included nurse educators, textbooks of adult nursing published in Korea, and the course outline for adult nursing used in one college of nursing. The Results show that there was common agreement on 39 nursing diagnosis which should be included in the adult nursing curriculum, textbooks of adult nursing, and patient care on the medical-surgical units. The two existing nursing diagnosis classification systems (NANDA and Gordon's Human Response Patterns) show different basic frameworks and difficulties were discovered in integration of nursing diagnosis into the curriculum. To develop a conceptual framework for a nursing diagnosis classification system, diagnosis were classified into three categories; health promotion, high risk problem, and actual problem on the basis of the framework used in adult nursing textbooks and Gordon's 11 Functional Health Patterns. Subconcepts for actual problems were classified as; activity and rest, nutrition and elimination, perception and coordination, stress and coping. Progress in this study supports further development of a conceptual framework of nursing based on a nursing diagnosis classification system, from which improvement in nursing education and clinical practice can be expected.

Various accidents and injuries are currently occuring in Korea at increasingly high rates. Good quality emergency care service is urgently needed to cope with these various forms of accidents and injuries. In order to develop a sound emergency care system, there need to be a plan to educate and train professionals specifically in emergency care. One solution for the on going problem would be to educate and train emergency clinical nurse specialists. This study on a strategy for curriculum development for emergency clinical nurse specialist was based on the following five content areas, developed from literature related to the curriculum of emergency nursing and emergency care situation: 1. Nurses working in the emergency rooms of three university hospitals were analyzed for six days to identify categories of nursing activities. 2. Two hundreds and eleven nurses working in the emergency rooms of 12 university hospitals were surveyed to identify needs for educational content that should be included in a curriculum for the clinical nurse specialist. 3. Examination of the environment in which emergency management was provided. 4. Identification of characteristics of patients in the emergency room. 5. The role of emergency clinical nurse specialist was identified through literature, recent data, and research materials. The following curriculum was formulated using the above mentioned process. 1. The philosophy of education for emergency clinical nurse specialist was established through a realistic philosophical framework. In this frame, client, environment, health, nursing, and learning have been defined. 2. The purpose of education is framed on individual development, social structure, nursing process and responsibility along with the role and function of the emergency clinical nurse specialist. 3. The central theme was based on human, environment, health and nursing. 4. The elements of structure in the curriculum content were divided to include two major threads, i.e., vertical and horizontal: The vertical thread to consist of the client, life cycle, education, research, leadership and consultation, and the horizontal thread to consist of level of nursing (prevention to rehabilitation), and health to illness based on the health care system developed by Betty Neuman system model. 5. Behavioral objectives for education were structured according to the emergency clinical nurse specialist role and function as a master degree prepared in various emergency settings. 6. The content of the curriculum consisted of three core courses(9 credits), five major courses(15 credits), six elective courses(12 credits) and six prerequisite courses (12 credits). Thus 48credits are required. Recommendations: 1. To promote the quality of the emergency care system, the number of emergency professionals, has to be expanded. Further the role and function of the emergency clinical nurse specialist needs to be specified in both the medical law and the Nursing Practice Act. 2. In order to upgrade the qualification of emergency clinical nurse specialists, the course should be given as part of the graduate program. 3. Certification should be issued through the Korean Nurses Association.

This study was done to provide information which would lead to nursing care of the elderly being more holistically through an understanding of the phenomena of powerlessness based on the lived experience of powernessless by the elderly, the meaning the elderly give to such phenomena, and what essence of powerlessness is. The methodology used in this study was Max Van Manen's phenomenological method based on the philosophy of Merleu-Ponty and a concerete approach was realized through the 11 steps suggested in the Van Manen's method. Data collection was done from March 2, 1995 to December 30, 1995. The subjects for this study were four elderly persons who lived with their families and who were over 60 years of age. Data were collected about the lived experience of the elderly, this researcher's experience of powerlessness, the linguistic meaning of powerlessness, idioms of the word or a feeling of powerlessness, and descriptions of powerlessness in the elderly as they appeared in the literature, are works, and phenomenological literature. All data were used to provide insights into the phenomena of powerlessness. Data about the experience of powerlessness by the elderly were collected through open interviews, participation, and observation. In the anlaysis of the theme of this study, the aspects of the theme, powerlessness in the elderly were clarified, thereby abstracting and finding meaningful statements by the elderly about their feeling of powerlessness, and then those significant statements were expressed as lingnistic transformations. The summarized findings from the study are as follows: 1. Five meanings of powerlessness in the elderly were defined, (weakness), (dependence), (frustration), (worthlessness) and (giving up). 2. (Weakness) means that the elderly experience, not only their aging but also, their becoming weak and the loss of physical function frequently caused by diseases. (Dependence) means that the elderly experience dependence without any influence from the surroundings and that elderly patients who are hospitalized lose their autonomy, follow entirely their doctor's prescriptions, use aid equipment and directions, and depend only on those things. (Frustration) means that the elderly experience the loss of their roles from the past, there by feeling that there is no work for them to do anymore and therefore feel unable to do anything. (Worthlessness) means that the elderly experience the feeling of losing their social roles from the past, having no financial ability, thereby being a burden to their children or the people around them, and therefore regarding themselves useless. (Giving up) means that the elderly experience the feeling of closeness to death in the final stage of their lifetime, lose hope to be bealed from their disease, and recognize the incontrollability of their own body. 3. From a general view of the meaning of the theme the powerlessness in the elderly -the most essential meaning of the theme is the (sense of loss). For the elderly are experiencing a sense of loss in the situation of being elderly and therefore being often hospitalized. Brief definitions of the five phenomena could be (weakness) meaning the loss of physical strength, (dependence) the loss of mentality caused by disease and hospitalization, (frustration) and (worthlessness) the loss of social performance caused by the loss of social functions from the past, and lastly (giving up) the loss of the controllability of such situations of aging and suffering disease. In light of the discussion above, it is understandable that the hospitalized elderly experience powerlessness not only as it related to their diseases but also to their normal aging, and this related to other characteristics of being elderly means that the (sense of loss) is the very essence of their powerlessness. 4. While most cases are of the normal elderly experiencing powerlessness in relation to their social network, cases of elderly who are hospitalized are of those experiencing powerlessness in relation to the loss of their physical desire. 5. The findings discussed above can serve as guidelines for nurses who take care of the ill elderly who are hospitalized and that can provide cues to appropriate nursing service, recognizing that the subjective experience of the objective age of the elderly is so important. Nurses can provide highly qualitative nursing service, based on their deep understanding of the suffering of the elderly due to feelings of powerlssness.