Psychometric evaluation of the subjective well-being measure GP-CORE in a group of older adults in Sweden

BACKGROUND: The world’s growing population of older adults is one population that needs to be focused more regarding subjective well-being. It is therefore important to evaluate self-report instruments that measures general well-being for this specific group - older adults. The aim of the present study was to investigate psychometric properties of the Swedish translation of the GP-CORE (general population – Clinical Outcomes in Routine Evaluation) in a group of older adults (> 65 years). METHODS: In this study, a psychometric evaluation of the GP-CORE is presented for 247 Swedish older adults (> 65 years), 184 women and 63 men who applied for home care assistance for the first time. RESULTS: The psychometric evaluation showed high acceptability; provided norm values in terms of means, standard deviations and quartiles; showed satisfactory reliability in terms of both internal consistency and stability; showed satisfactory validity in terms of convergent and discriminant validity; provided a very preliminary cut-off value and quite low sensibility and sensitivity and showed results which indicated that this scale is sensitive to changes. One gender difference was identified in that women without a cohabitant had a higher well-being than men without a cohabitant (as measured by GP-CORE). CONCLUSIONS: The GP-CORE showed satisfactory psychometric properties to be used to measure and monitor subjective well-being in older adults (> 65 years) in the general population of community dwelling. Future studies should establish a cut-off value in relation to another well-being measure relevant for mental health in older adults.