Background and Purpose-The incidence of falls among noninstitutionalized individuals with long-standing stroke has not been examined previously, although fractures are more common and the consequences more severe for stroke patients than for elderly people in general. Methods-For 4 months (September to December 1998), we followed 111 home-living patients who had suffered a stroke a mean of 10 years previously and 143 control subjects randomly selected from the same municipality, matched with respect to age and sex. Falls were registered daily by use of "fall calendars." Before the fall registration period, information about morbidity, use of medication, and activities of daily living had been registered. Height, weight, vision, blood pressure, motor function, and body sway had been measured, and depressive symptoms as well as cognitive function had been assessed. Results-During follow-up, 23% of the patients and 11% of the control subjects fell once or more, and the risk of falling at least once was more than twice as high for the patients with stroke, when controlled for potential confounders (relative riskϭ2.2; 95% CI, 1.1 to 4.3). Among the stroke patients, depressive symptomatology predicted falls, and the relative risk for falling increased by 1.5 per standard deviation increase in the depression score. Conclusions-We conclude that falls are more frequent among noninstitutionalized long-term stroke survivors than among community control subjects and that the risk of falling and depressive symptoms are related in stroke patients. (Stroke. 2002;33:542-547.)
In this large population-based sample of older persons across eight cohorts, hip fracture was associated with excess short- and long-term all-cause mortality in both sexes.
Supplementation with 20,000 IU vitamin D(3) weekly did not result in beneficial effects on the measured multiple sclerosis-related outcomes. This study was not powered to address clinical outcomes, but none of the results were suggestive of an effect in this unselected population of fully ambulatory persons with multiple sclerosis.
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