Researchers at Johns Hopkins University, in Baltimore, MD, have found that a series of simple tests can help care providers predict whether older women will develop physical disabilities in the near future.
"Clinicians do not have an easy-to-use screening tool to assist them in identifying older adults who are at the highest risk of developing mobility difficulty in the short term," says Paulo Henrique M. Chaves, M.D., Ph.D., lead author of the study, and an instructor of medicine at Johns Hopkins.
Approximately 35 to 50 percent of women between the ages of 70 and 80 have a hard time with general mobility tasks like walking a few blocks, climbing a flight of stairs or doing heavy housework. Researchers studied 266 women between the ages of 70 and 79 who reported no difficulty in mobility tasks; nearly half lived alone. They were given an initial assessment and then reassessed at 18 months. After a year and a half, almost 24 percent of study participants developed some disability, such as difficulty walking three to five blocks, climbing 10 steps or getting into or out of a car or bus.
Researchers noted they could identify those women at risk of suffering mobility problems in the future by looking at several predictive features. These simple measurements include measuring the time it takes an older woman to walk a metre, measuring the length of time she can balance on one leg, or determining the adaptations she has made in performing simple tasks. They have developed predictive graphs, called nomograms, which other physicians could use to assess mobility risk in their own patients.
"Care providers who adopt these nomograms in their practice could use the results to reassure patients with high function, and seek further clinical evaluation for patients at high risk for mobility loss," Dr. Chaves says.
Source
- Arch Intern Med. 2000;160:2525-2533.
