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[Pain in the elderly: Quality of life, functionality and associated factors. SABE Study, Bogotá, Colombia]
Miguel Germán Borda1, Juan Carlos Acevedo González2, David Gabriel David3
1Instituto de Envejecimiento, Pontificia Universidad Javeriana, Bogotá, Colombia; Semillero de Neurociencias y Envejecimiento, Facultad de Medicina, Pontificia Universidad Javeriana, Bogotá, Colombia; Hospital Universitario San Ignacio, Bogotá, Colombia.
Objective:
To determine the impact of pain on the quality of life in older adults and its association with functionality.
Materials And Methods:
Data was taken from SABE Bogota study. A cross-sectional study was carried out during 2012, interviewing 2,000 individuals of 60 years and older, as a probabilistic cluster and representative sample. The variable 'presence of pain' to was used to identify associations with sociodemographic factors, self-rated health, comorbidities, functional status, cognitive status, and quality of life. The latter was estimated using a visual analogue scale of the EuroQOL tool (EQ-VAS).
Results:
The majority of older adults were women (63.4%); the mean age was 71.17 years (SD=8.05), with a higher frequency of individuals in the age group between 60 and 69years (48%). When comparing groups with pain vs. no pain, significantly lower scores were found in the group with pain (P<.001) in both the functionality and quality of life EQ-VAS scales. The strongest associations with pain were: joint diseases (OR: 3.08 [2.24-4.23]), severe depression (OR: 2.80 [1.63-4.79]) and functional impairment of the Basic Activities of Daily Living (BADL) (OR: 2.45 [1.31-4.58]).
Conclusions:
Pain negatively impacts the functional independence and the perception of the quality of life in older adults, predisposing them to adverse outcomes.
