Characterization of Older Adults Who Attribute Functional Decrements to “Old Age”

OBJECTIVE: Understanding the contributors to physical disability in older adults is an important component of the national health objective of expanding disability‐free life by the year 2000. The purpose of this study was to determine the frequency with which older adults attribute their difficulty performing a number of common daily tasks to “old age” and to identify specific conditions and diseases associated with this attribution. Finally we sought to determine the characteristics that might differentiate persons able to attribute their disability to specific conditions from those who cite old age as the etiology of their disability.

[1]  J. Polak,et al.  Age‐Related Trends in Cardiovascular Morbidity and Physical Functioning in the Elderly: The Cardiovascular Health Study , 1993, Journal of the American Geriatrics Society.

[2]  M. Roth,et al.  The Association Between Quantitative Measures of Dementia and of Senile Change in the Cerebral Grey Matter of Elderly Subjects , 1968, British Journal of Psychiatry.

[3]  C. Mulrow,et al.  Association Between Hearing Impairment and the Quality of Life of Elderly Individuals , 1990, Journal of the American Geriatrics Society.

[4]  M. Roth.  The natural history of mental disorder in old age. , 1955, The Journal of mental science.

[5]  N. Resnick,et al.  Urinary Incontinence—Where Do We Stand and Where Do We Go From Here? , 1990, Journal of the American Geriatrics Society.

[6]  L. S. Mitteness.  Knowledge and Beliefs about Urinary Incontinence in Adulthood and Old Age , 1990, Journal of the American Geriatrics Society.

[7]  L. Kuller,et al.  Systolic Hypertension in the Elderly Program (SHEP) , 1986, Journal of the American Geriatrics Society.

[8]  J. Murphy,et al.  Risk of functional decline among well elders. , 1989, Journal of clinical epidemiology.

[9]  J D Williamson,et al.  Functional decline in older adults: expanding methods of ascertainment. , 1996, The journals of gerontology. Series A, Biological sciences and medical sciences.

[10]  R. Kronmal,et al.  The Cardiovascular Health Study: design and rationale. , 1991, Annals of epidemiology.

[11]  M. G. Kovar,et al.  The Supplement on Aging to the 1984 National Health Interview Survey. , 1987, Vital and health statistics. Ser. 1, Programs and collection procedures.

[12]  J. Guralnik,et al.  Physical disability in older Americans. , 1993, Journal of gerontology.

[13]  M. Beers,et al.  The Geriatric “Medical and Public Health” Imperative Revisited , 1993, Journal of the American Geriatrics Society.

[14]  A M Jette,et al.  The Framingham Disability Study: II. Physical disability among the aging. , 1981, American journal of public health.

[15]  Linda P. Fried,et al.  The Women's Health and Aging Study: Health and Social Characteristics of Older Women with Disability , 1995 .

[16]  S. Harris,et al.  Adaptation to Disability. , 1985 .

[17]  T. Pearlman.  Organic mental disorders. , 1992, The American journal of psychiatry.

[18]  F. Bess,et al.  Hearing Impairment as a Determinant of Function in the Elderly , 1989, Journal of the American Geriatrics Society.

[19]  Bonnie K. Lind,et al.  Physical disability in older adults: a physiological approach. Cardiovascular Health Study Research Group. , 1994, Journal of clinical epidemiology.

[20]  L. Fried,et al.  Self‐Reported Causes of Physical Disability in Older People: The Cardiovascular Health Study , 1994, Journal of the American Geriatrics Society.

[21]  D. Felson,et al.  Defining arthritis and measuring functional status in elders: methodological issues in the study of disease and physical disability. , 1990, American journal of public health.

[22]  J. Neuhaus,et al.  Long-term physical functioning in persons with knee osteoarthritis from NHANES. I: Effects of comorbid medical conditions. , 1994, Journal of clinical epidemiology.

[23]  S. Alam,et al.  Cardiovascular Disease in the Elderly , 1986, Developments in Cardiovascular Medicine.

[24]  L. Ferrucci,et al.  A short physical performance battery assessing lower extremity function: association with self-reported disability and prediction of mortality and nursing home admission. , 1994, Journal of gerontology.

[25]  S. Folstein,et al.  "Mini-mental state". A practical method for grading the cognitive state of patients for the clinician. , 1975, Journal of psychiatric research.

[26]  K Hirschhorn,et al.  Letter: Immunotherapy for colorectal cancer. , 1976, Lancet.

[27]  L. Verbrugge,et al.  Risk factors for disability among U.S. adults with arthritis. , 1991, Journal of clinical epidemiology.