Elderly Health Journal
Volume:7 Issue: 1, Jun 2021

World Health Organization (WHO) data show higher vulnerable rates of COVID-19 among older adults especially in those with underlying diseases. WHO recommended particularly limitations of social communications for older adults so that control virus transmission among these vulnerable populations. Recommended restrictions included social distancing and stay at home (1). Social distancing is a known health method to decrease infection transmission by stopping close contact with infected people. Likewise, staying at home is intended at reducing transmission rates. Results in these restrictions cause many older adults in the world to have been at home with minimal social connections for a long time (1). Social distancing leads to social isolation and loneliness further in older adults that these outcomes related to poorer health and wellbeing. Moreover, vast loneliness produces a decrease in quality of life, well-being, and social support by making small social networks and lower social connections in older adult populations (2). Also, recommendations for regard social distance in nursing homes cause residents to lose effective contact with visitors (children, friends, etc.) and are associated with negative outcomes such as loneliness and social isolation.

Higher personal mastery is associated with better physical functioning, wellbeing, and longevity among older populations. However, few studies have focused on whether personal mastery is protective against mortality among older adults living with diabetes over time. 

A total of 1,779 participants were identified from an off-year survey of the Health and Retirement Study. Proportional Hazard Models were used to evaluate the significance of selected variables in predicting the survival of participants over a 13-year period.

A substantial proportion (46.7%) of the diabetic patients had survived by the end of 2016. Adults with lower mastery scores were more likely to die (Hazard Ratio = .94, p < .001). Gender differences in the association patterns between personal mastery and survival were identified. Personal mastery had an independent health-protective effect on the survival of diabetes patients over the study period. With lower educational attainment, the foreign-born female diabetics scored higher in personal mastery measure when compared to their male counterparts. In the face of more severe diabetes comorbidity, foreign-born female diabetics also  outlived their male counterparts over the study period.

As a crucial psychological resource and a modifiable factor, personal mastery holds a potential for improving the health status among lower SES groups of older adults. Further investigations into the identified gender difference could be applied to break the cycle of poor health among lower Socio-Economic Status groups of older adults.

People do health care not only to diagnose and relieve pain but also to reduce pain, anxiety, and loneliness in their daily lives. The present study aims to evaluate the effectiveness of Morita therapy among older women suffering from emotional distress and social isolation with chronic knee pain.

The research method was pretest - posttest with a control group. The statistical population of the study included the older adults with chronic knee pain in the period of May to August 2020 in Tabriz, Iran. The sample consisted of 30 female patients aged 60-70 years with chronic knee pain who entered the study by convenience sampling method and randomly assigned to experimental and control group (15 patients each group). The research instruments included the Depression Anxiety and Stress Scale (DASS-21) and the Lubben Social Network Scale (LSNS). In the experimental group, Morita therapy was held during nine sessions for 90 minutes once a week. 

The results of multivariate analysis of covariance showed significant effectiveness of Morita therapy on emotional distress and social isolation (p < 0.001). Morita therapy significantly reduced patientschr('39') depression and anxiety scores (Eta = 0.68). In addition, the social isolation scores of the experimental group significantly reduced compared to the control group (p < 0.001), which indicates an increase in the quality of social network (Eta = 0.49).

Morita therapy can help reduce emotional distress and social isolation in older women with chronic knee pain and can be used in conjunction with other common therapies.

Aging may increase physical or functional limitations, and India has a rapidly aging population. This study aimed to assess the prevalence and correlates of difficulties with Activities of Daily Living (ADL) and Instrumental Activities of Daily Living (IADL) among older adults in India.

The cross-sectional sample consisted of 31,477 individuals (≥ 60 years) from the Longitudinal Aging Study in India, Wave 1 in 2017-2019. Functional disability was measured with 6 items of ADL and 7 items of IADL.

The prevalence of at least one ADL difficulty was 23.8%, at least one IADL difficulty was 48.4%, and at least one ADL/IADL difficulty was 52.0% (43.2% among men, and 60.0% among women). In the adjusted logistic regression analysis, older age, and food insecurity were positively and male sex and having a health insurance were negatively associated with both ADL and IADL difficulty. No formal education was positively and urban residence and married were negatively associated with IADL difficulty. Poor or faith self-rated health status, chronic conditions, insomnia symptoms, major depressive disorder, physical pain, poor distant vision, poor near vision and poor word recall were positively associated with both ADL and IADL difficulty. Body underweight and hearing or ear problem increased the odds for IADL difficulty. In univariate analysis, vigorous physical activity and higher social network were protective against both ADL and IADL difficulty.

Almost one in four older adults in India had ADL difficulty and almost half had IADL difficulty and several associated factors were identified that can be targeted in interventions.

Healthcare- Associated Infections (HAI) are known to be one of the most important health issues in developed and developing countries. The most common infections include central line-associated bloodstream infections, catheter-associated urinary tract infections, ventilator-associated pneumonia and surgical site infection. The aim of this study was to investigate the incidence of nosocomial infections in the elderly patients.

In this cross-sectional study, 1279 patients were 60 years of age or older. Patients who had been admitted for more than 48 hours in the hospital and had no signs of infection at the time of admission, were entered into the study. It was evaluated four most common HAI, according to CDC include bacteremia, central line-associated blood stream infections, urinary tract infections, and ventilator-associated pneumonia. Infections may also occur at surgery sites, known as surgical site infections. The Chi-square and T- test or analysis of variance was used for data analysis.

Of the total patients, 93 (7.3%) developed HAI at duration admission. The highest rate of infection was bacteremia, which was 48.4 % and then urinary tract infection 21.5%. The prevalence of HAI among patients with cardiovascular diseases was relatively higher than underlying diseases. The frequency of length of hospital stay was significant in patients > 7 days with 68.8% in the HAI group.

Our findings showed that patients with cardiovascular, renal and pulmonary disease are more susceptible to HAIs. Due to the increased length of hospital stay increases the risk of infection, it is recommended to discharge patients as soon as possible.

The most common nutritional problem observed among the aged is malnutrition. The study was conducted as methodological research to evaluate the validity and reliability of the Turkish Self Mini Nutritional Assessment Scale (Self-MNA) among Turkish elderly people.

Data were collected from 131 aged individuals with the Sociodemographic Information Form, Mini Nutritional Assessment long-form (MNA), Mini Nutritional Assessment short-form (MNA-SF) and Self-MNA. In the study, test-retest, parallel form methods, lower 27%-upper 27% discrimination, ROC and correlation analysis were used to evaluate the validity and reliability of the scale. The scale was translated and then the final version was created by the views of three experts. A correlation analysis was conducted between MNA, MNA-SF and Self-MNA which are used as parallel forms. 

No statistically significant difference was found between test-retest scores of Self-MNA scores for reliability (p > 0.05). Positive relationships were found between Self-MNA and MNA and MNA-SF. Self-MNA scores of the upper 27% group were significantly higher than the Self-MNA scores of the lower 27% group. The appropriate cut-off value of Self MNA is determined as 12. Self-MNA scores below 12 points indicate that there may be a risk of malnutrition. The areas under the ROC curves (AUC = 0.718) were statistically significant (p < 0.05). At the cut-off value, the sensitivity is determined to be 75 and the specificity is 56.63. 

Self-MNA is a valid and reliable tool for screening the malnutrition status of the aged in Turkey.

Aging involves a decrease in  physiological function, physical activity and nutrition that modulate body functions. The aim of this study was to evaluate the effect of a six week-swimming interval training with resveratrol consumption on apoptotic markers in the liver tissue of aged rat.

In this experimental study, thirty-two 20-month aged rats weighing 350-370 g were divided into four groups of 8 rats including 1) sham, 2) training, 3) resveratrol and 4) training + resveratrol. For six weeks, groups 3 and 4 received 100 mg/kg of resveratrol supplementation dissolved in 1% methylcellulose daily by gavage, and groups 2 and 4 performed swimming training three times a week. One-way analysis of variance with Tukeychr('39')s post- hoc test was used to analyze the data (p < 0.05).

Bcl2 Gene expression levels in the resveratrol and the exercise + resveratrol groups were significantly higher than the sham and exercise groups (p < 0.05).  Bax levels in the exercise + resveratrol group were lower than the resveratrol group, and the levels in the resveratrol group were higher than the sham group(p <0.05).also Bax/Bcl2 levels in the exercise + resveratrol group were significantly lower than the exercise group(p < 0.05).

It seems that swimming interval training with resveratrol consumption has beneficial effects on anti-apoptotic markers, however, the effect of swimming interval training on liver apoptosis in the aging is still unknown and more studies are needed in this field.

Increasing age is one of the most important predictors of mortality among aged population. Therefore, determining the causes of death among older people could be imperative. The purpose of this study was to investigate non-communicable disease mortality among a sample of older people in Iran from 2007 to 2018.

This was a retrospective descriptive study that applied census sampling technique to investigate 1202 Medical Records of older adults (60 ≤ years old) died during 2007-2018 at three hospitals of Khuzestan province, Iran. Data analysis was conducted using SPSS version 24 software.

The mean age of participants was 77.4 ± 8.38. Of whom 50.7 % were male. The highest number of deaths were related to the internal ward (41.4%), CCU (29.3%) and ICU (25.6%), respectively. In addition, Angina pectoris, Respiratory disease and Cerebrovascular Accident were the most important cause of death among aged population. Also, the history of hospitalization (87.1%) and cardiovascular disease (82.2%), and hypertension (67.8%) were the prominent risk factors for mortality among aged population. According to chi-squared, there was a significant relationship between smoking and death attributed to cardiovascular diseases among older adults.

Angina pectoris, Respiratory disease and Cerebrovascular accident diseases are the most important cause of death among older adults. Prevention and screening programs should be implemented to discern and screen these chronic diseases at the early stage among older people.