1. Introduction
Aging is one of the natural stages of human life that begins with birth and ends with death. However, old age is associated with physiological, psychological, and social changes [1]. Technical and medical advances have improved the humans health status, life expectancy, and accordingly the number of older people [2]. The increasing growth of aging population is a global phenomenon that has become a crisis [3]. The number of older people over 60 years old in the world now is more than the child population [4]. The older people draw more attention now because they have multiple health problems, and the increase in aging population is associated with substantial health costs. Studies in this area have shown that the treatment costs will increase with the onset of aging [5].
Among the consequences that aging may have is a decrease in hope, happiness, and quality of life. The older adults are exposed to loneliness, isolation, and lack of social support, and their independence is often threatened due to physical and mental disabilities. The consequences of these conditions are a decline in the quality of life [12] and, ultimately, in their hope and happiness. Snyder sees hope as a multidimensional issue (goals, agency, and pathways) with a cognitive structure focused on the future [7]. 
Considered by researchers, happiness is one of the critical variables in the field of mental health and quality of life. It involves positive affection, like satisfaction and lack of negative affections such as depression and anxiety [11]. The World Health Organization (2002) considers quality of life as a broad concept that encompasses physical health, personal belief, psychological states, level of independence, social relationships, and relationship with the environment, which are based on one’s perception [15]. This study aims to evaluate the effectiveness of self-care empowerment training on hope, happiness, and quality of life of older people living in Iranian elderly care centers in Dubai, UAE.
2. Materials and Methods
This research is a quasi-experimental study with a pre-test-post-test design using control group. The study population consisted of all older people living in Iranian elderly care centers in Dubai. Of these, 40 were selected as study samples (20 men and 20 women) and were randomly assigned into two groups of intervention (10 men and 10 women) and control (10 men and 10 women). The inclusion criteria were being resident in nursing homes, willing to participate in educational sessions, lacking mental and physical disorders, and having at least a secondary education. The exclusion criterion was withdrawal from participation in any session. The intervention group received self-care education one 2 h session per week for 3 months (In total 12 sessions). The data collection tools were Snyder hope scale, the Oxford happiness inventory, and the World Health Organization quality of life scale. The collected data were analyzed in SPSS v. 21 using multivariate analysis of variance (MANCOVA).
3. Results
 Table 1 presents the mean scores of all participants regarding their hope, happiness, and quality of life. After confirmation of study assumptions using Kolmogorov-Smirnov test for normality of data, Levene’s test for homogeneity of variances, and Box’s M test for equality of multiple variances, the obtained data were analyzed by MANCOVA. The results are shown in Table 2.
As can be seen, there is a significant difference between the two groups in the post-test scores of hope (F=18.78; P<0.001), happiness (F=27.55; P<0.001) and quality of life (F=54.30; P<0.001). In other words, by controlling for pre-test variables, the older people’s hope, happiness, and quality of life scores increased, and the intervention group showed a significant increase in the scores after the intervention compared to the control group. Hence, self-care empowerment training improved hope, happiness, and quality of life in older people.
4. Conclusion
Self-care empowerment training can increase hope, happiness, and quality of life in older people living in nursing homes which is consistent with the result of Davies (2011),  Keshtkaran et al. (2010) [23, 27].
Ethical Considerations
Compliance with ethical guidelines
All ethical principles were considered in this article. The participants were informed about the purpose of the research and its implementation stages; they were also assured about the confidentiality of their information; Moreover, They were allowed to leave the study whenever they wish, and if desired, the results of the research would be available to them.
Funding
This research did not receive any specific grant from funding agencies in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors.
Authors' contributions
All authors contributed in preparing this article.
Conflicts of interest
The authors declared no conflict of interest.
 

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