A cohort study on the influence of the chronic diseases on activities of daily living of the elderly aged 65 years and over in China / 中华流行病学杂志

ABSTRACT

Objective: To understand the influence of chronic diseases on the risk of impaired activities of daily living (ADL) of the elderly. Methods: Baseline data of 10 501 elderly individuals recruited by the Chinese Longitudinal Healthy Longevity Survey in 2002 were used, and follow up for this population was conducted until 2014. Cox Proportional Hazard Model was used to estimate the hazards ratios (HR) for the associations between five kinds of chronic diseases, the number of chronic diseases and the risk of ADL impairment in different age groups of the elderly. Results: Hypertension increased the risk of ADL impairment in the elderly of all age groups, which increased the ADL impaired risk by 43% (HR=1.43, 95%CI: 1.14-1.79) in group aged 65-74 years, 21% (HR=1.21, 95%CI: 1.02-1.43) in group aged 75-89 years and 20% (HR=1.20, 95%CI: 1.02-1.43) in group aged 90-105 years, respectively. Diabetes and cerebrovascular disease increased the ADL impaired risk by 102%(HR=2.02, 95%CI: 1.29-3.17), and 79% (HR=1.79, 95%CI: 1.24-2.58) in group aged 65-74 years, respectively. 'Suffering from one chronic disease' increased the ADL impaired risk by 13% (HR=1.13, 95%CI: 1.02-1.25), and suffering from two or more chronic diseases increased the ADL impaired risk by 25% (HR=1.25, 95%CI: 1.13-1.40) in all the age groups. Suffering from two or more chronic diseases increased the ADL impaired risk by 50% (HR=1.50, 95%CI: 1.21-1.87) in group aged 65-74 years and 17% (HR=1.17, 95%CI: 1.01-1.38) in groups aged 75-89 years. Conclusions: Hypertension was one of the most important risk factors for the impaired ADL in the elderly population in all age groups. Hypertension, diabetes, cerebrovascular disease or comorbidity increased the risk of impaired ADL in group aged 65-74 years.