Falls Among Older Adults: A Public Health Concern

2011 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 13-18
Author(s):  
J. Handelsman
2020 ◽  
Vol 20 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Abdu Oumer Abdu ◽  
Imam Dagne Yimamu ◽  
Ahmed Ale Kahsay

Abstract Background A nutritional problem, especially under nutrition is one of the common public health problems in older population causing greater mortality and economic loss in developing countries. However, evidences on the risk factors for increased nutritional risk among older population is not well stated in Ethiopia. This study aimed to assess the nutritional status and predictors of malnutrition among older adults (> = 65 years) in Eastern Ethiopia. Methods A community-based analytical survey was conducted among randomly selected 592 older people aged above 65 years of age in Harari region. Subjects were selected using multistage sampling pretested Full Mini Nutritional Assessment (MNA) tool was used to classify as malnourished (MNA score < 17), at risk of malnutrition (MNA score of 17 to 23.5) and otherwise normal. Validated geriatric depression scale short form (15 items) was employed to screen for depression. Data were presented using statistical tables, frequency, percentage, and graphs. Ordinary logistic regression was employed to identify predictors of malnutrition and plum method was used to generate odds ratio. The level of statistical significance was declared at P-value less than 5%. Chi-square test, crude and adjusted odds ratio with 95% confidence was reported. Results A total of 592 respondents (93.4%) were interviewed. About 306 (51.7%) and 93 (15.7%) were found to be at risk of malnutrition and malnourished respectively. The predicted log odds of being malnourished was higher among those from rural residents (AOR = 2.08: 1.25–3.45), not on working (AOR = 1.31: 95% CI: 0.87–1.95) and did not have health insurance (AOR = 1.58; 95% CI; 0.97–2.58). Those with chronic pain (AOR = 1.70; 95% CI: 1.15–2.51), previous hospitalization (AOR = 1.59: 95% CI: 1.27–2.38) and not able to cover their personal expense (AOR =1.61: 95% CI: 1.12–2.30) were predictors of malnutrition. The relationship between previous hospitalizations with malnutrition among older adults people is moderated significantly by the presence of chronic pain (β = 0.113, p = 0.015). Conclusions Malnutrition among old age is a public health concern that needs attention. Economical vulnerability, residence, depression, presence of chronic disease, and hospitalization were important risk factors for malnutrition among old age.


2021 ◽  
Vol 22 (9) ◽  
pp. 4339
Author(s):  
Erika Aparecida Silveira ◽  
Rômulo Roosevelt da Silva Filho ◽  
Maria Claudia Bernardes Spexoto ◽  
Fahimeh Haghighatdoost ◽  
Nizal Sarrafzadegan ◽  
...  

Obesity is globally a serious public health concern and is associated with a high risk of cardiovascular disease (CVD) and various types of cancers. It is important to evaluate various types of obesity, such as visceral and sarcopenic obesity. The evidence on the associated risk of CVD, cancer and sarcopenic obesity, including pathophysiological aspects, occurrence, clinical implications and survival, needs further investigation. Sarcopenic obesity is a relatively new term. It is a clinical condition that primarily affects older adults. There are several endocrine-hormonal, metabolic and lifestyle aspects involved in the occurrence of sarcopenic obesity that affect pathophysiological aspects that, in turn, contribute to CVD and neoplasms. However, there is no available evidence on the role of sarcopenic obesity in the occurrence of CVD and cancer and its pathophysiological interplay. Therefore, this review aims to describe the pathophysiological aspects and the clinical and epidemiological evidence on the role of sarcopenic obesity related to the occurrence and mortality risk of various types of cancer and cardiovascular disease. This literature review highlights the need for further research on sarcopenic obesity to demonstrate the interrelation of these various associations.


2017 ◽  
Vol 29 (12) ◽  
pp. 2105-2106 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mara Smith ◽  
Ana Hategan ◽  
James A. Bourgeois

To the Editor: The gaming industry is growing rapidly, as is the proportion of older adults aged 65 years or older who participate in gambling (Tse et al., 2012). With casinos tailoring their venues and providing incentives to attract older adults, and with the increasing popularity of “pleasure trips” to casinos organized by retirement homes, plus active promotion of government-operated lotteries in many countries, this trend is likely to continue. Gambling disorder (GD) or “pathological” or “problem” gambling presents a public health concern in the geriatric population. However, ascertainment of its prevalence and diagnostic accuracy have proven challenging. This is largely due to the absence of diagnostic criteria specific to the geriatric age and rating scales validated for use in this population.


Author(s):  
Bethan Evans ◽  
Charlotte Cooper

Over the last twenty years or so, fatness, pathologised as overweight and obesity, has been a core public health concern around which has grown a lucrative international weight loss industry. Referred to as a ‘time bomb’ and ‘the terror within’, analogies of ‘war’ circulate around obesity, framing fatness as enemy.2 Religious imagery and cultural and moral ideologies inform medical, popular and policy language with the ‘sins’ of ‘gluttony’ and ‘sloth’, evoked to frame fat people as immoral at worst and unknowledgeable victims at best, and understandings of fatness intersect with gender, class, age, sexuality, disability and race to make some fat bodies more problematically fat than others. As Evans and Colls argue, drawing on Michel Foucault, a combination of medical and moral knowledges produces the powerful ‘obesity truths’ through which fatness is framed as universally abject and pathological. Dominant and medicalised discourses of fatness (as obesity) leave little room for alternative understandings.


2004 ◽  
Vol 8 (32) ◽  
Author(s):  

Resistance to antimicrobials has become a major public health concern, and it has been shown that there is a relationship, albeit complex, between antimicrobial resistance and consumption


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