KUMJ | VOL. 24 | NO. 1 | ISSUE 94 | JANUARY - MARCH, 2026

Mental Health and Spiritual Well-being of Senior Citizens Residing in a Community, Kathmandu
Adhikari S, Pandey A

Abstract:
Background Senior citizens face many physical, social, and psycho-emotional needs and challenges. Mental health and spiritual well-being are critical components among senior citizens residing in communities where support systems vary and affect overall health and quality of life. Objective To identify the mental health and spiritual well-being of senior citizens. Method A descriptive cross-sectional study was conducted among 207 senior citizens in a community. A non-probability convenience sampling technique was used. Respondents were interviewed using the General Health Questionnaire-12 (GHQ-12) and the Spiritual Well-being Scale (SWBS) Nepali version. Data was collected from September 17 to October 14, 2023. The data were analyzed using frequency, mean, and percentage. The Chi-square test was used to measure the association of mental health and spiritual well-being with selected variables. Pearson correlation was used to measure the relationship between mental health and spiritual well-being of senior citizens. Result The findings of the study showed that 59.9% of respondents had good mental health. The majority (64.3%) of respondents had a moderate level of spiritual well-being. There was a negative correlation between the GHQ-12 score and spiritual well-being score (r = -0.567) at a 95% confidence level with a p-value < 0.001. Conclusion More than half of the respondents had good mental health, and the majority of respondents had a moderate level of spiritual well-being. This study provides evidence of a significant correlation between the mental health and spiritual wellbeing of senior citizens.
Keyword : Elderly, Mental health, Quality of life, Spirituality