Factors Affecting Mealtime Difficulties in Older Adults with Dementia Living in Long-Term Care Facilities: A Multilevel Model Analysis

Table 2

Multilevel analysis of the four fitted models on mealtime difficulties in older adults with dementia.

Parameters		Classifications		Model 1		Model 2		Model 3		Model 4
				Estimate	ρ	Estimate	ρ	Estimate	ρ	Estimate	ρ
Fixed effect		Intercept		34.49	<0.001	34.49	<0.001	34.49	<0.001	34.48	<0.001
		Age	Level 1			−0.04	0.492	−0.04	0.029	−0.02	0.037
		Gender (ref = men)				2.23	0.024	2.13	0.563	2.08	0.705
		Cognitive function				0.44	<0.001	0.40	<0.001	0.38	<0.001
		Activities of daily living				−1.93	<0.001	−1.94	<0.001	−1.91	<0.001
		Period of institutionalization				0.21	0.178	0.20	0.192	0.21	0.178
		Current work experience (years)	Level 2					−0.08	0.569	−0.05	0.741
		Attitude toward feeding						−0.07	0.276	−0.04	0.548
		Knowledge toward feeding						−0.36	0.124	−0.22	0.360
		Duration of the facility establishment	Level 3							−0.26	0.183
		Facility type								−0.10	0.958
		The total number of beds in facility								1.91	0.009
		Nurse ratio to admission capacity								−1.11	0.089
		Care worker ratio to admission capacity								0.02	0.730
		Meal assistant education experience (ref = no)								5.10	0.005
		Number of suitable environments for meals								−0.74	0.010
Random effect
Variance at level 1, ^2				65.12	<0.001	53.65	<0.001	53.82	<0.001	52.73	<0.001
Variance at level 2 ^2				0.99	0.871	0.03	0.994	0.29	0.925	1.83	0.613
Variance at level 3, ^2				34.49	<0.001	37.48	<0.001	31.48	<0.001	22.98	0.002
R1^2						0.334		0.316		0.309
R 2^2								0.919		0.368
R 3^2										0.309
R ^2				0		0.291		0.334		0.397