Life quality and associated factors in active elderly
International Journal of Development Research
Life quality and associated factors in active elderly
Received 09th August 2017; Received in revised form 14th September, 2017; Accepted 29th October, 2017; Published online 30th November, 2017
Copyright ©2017, Marilene Almeida Mendonça et al. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
Objectives: Assessing life quality and the associated factors in elderly people in the city of Vitória da Conquista/BA. Methods: This is an exploratory, descriptive and analytical research with cross-sectional design and quantitative approach, sub-project of the project: Interdisciplinary Program of Studies and Research on Human Aging: Actions of care and attention to the elderly. The data collection instruments used were: a social-demographic questionnaire, Barthel’s Index, Lawton and Brody’s Scale and Whoqol-bref. Results: one evidenced higher prevalence of literate females (83.1%), (57.6%) without a partner and (45.8%) with an income of up to three minimum wages. Most elderly (98.3%) presented some health problem, regardless of the BADL (71.1%) and dependent for IADL (64.4%). In relation to the areas, the psychological one showed the lowest rate (13.77%). By applying Spearman’s correlation coefficient between the study variables and the life quality areas, one verified that there was only significant statistical difference between the psychological realm and dependent for the Instrumental Activities of Daily Life (p=0000). Conclusion: One evidenced in this study that the dependence in the Instrumental Activities of Daily Life interferes with the psychological realm; this is related with the age advance and the increase of chronic conditions and functional changes that result in physical impairment, as emotional and psychological ones.
