The purpose of this study was to define and clarify the concept of 'resilience' in patients with cardiovascular diseases.

A hybrid model was used to develop the concept of resilience. The model included a field study carried out in Cheonan, Korea. The participants in this study were 9 patients with cardiovascular diseases who underwent a percutaneous coronary intervention.

The concept of resilience was found to be a complex phenomenon having meanings in two dimensions: the personal-dispositional and interpersonal dimensions. Four attributes and seven indicators were defined.

A resilient person was defined as one who has a positive attitude toward restoration, the power to reconstruct and control his/her disease (personal dimension), and support from a supportive system with supportive persons (interpersonal dimension). In the clinical setting, resilience plays an important role in managing the care plans of cardiovascular patients. Therefore, nurses who work closely with patients suffering from cardiovascular diseases should be aware of the attributes and indicators of resilience to enhance the resilience of their patients.

The purpose of this study was to identify the effects of exercise self-efficacy and exercise benefits/barriers on doing regular exercise among elderly.

The subjects were 484 older adults who were eligible and agreed to participate in this study. Data were collected from July 27 to September 21, 2007 by face-to-face, and private interviews. The questionnaires consisted of Exercise Self-efficacy, and Exercise Benefits/Barriers. The collected data were analyzed with the SPSS 13.0 program, which was used for frequency, percentage, mean, standard deviation, t-test, ANOVA, and logistic regression.

The major findings of this study were as follows: 1) Approximately 56.8% of participants were doing regular exercise. Study participants' exercise self-efficacy mean score was 36.30, exercise benefits 2.74, and exercise barriers 2.03; 2) There was significant correlation between exercise self-efficacy and exercise benefits; 3) Significant factors influencing regular exercise were self-efficacy, exercise benefits and exercise barriers.

These results suggested that nurses should emphasize exercise benefits/barriers and reinforce self-efficacy to improve regular exercise in the elderly.