Epidemiological studies conducted worldwide have reported knee pain as a common condition in the elderly (O'Reilly et al. 1998;Brooks 2006). A literature review by Peat et al. (2001) revealed that during a 1-year period, 25% of people over 55 years of age experience a persistent episode of knee pain. The prevalence of knee pain increases with age, and the tendency is stronger in women than men. The onset of new knee pain in community-dwelling adults over 50 years of age is accompanied by a substantial decline in physical function within a 3-year period (Jinks et al. 2007). In the same timeframe, only a quarter of the adults who have knee pain will experience resolution of the pain. However, their general health and physical function status will not return to the same levels they experienced prior to the onset. Further, a majority of the adults who continue to experience knee pain are women.Therefore, we require a new early intervention model for halting and reversing the progression of knee pain at the population level. Jinks et al. (2008) reported that almost a quarter of the adults with mild to moderate knee pain will develop severe or disabling knee pain within a 3-year period. This implies that healthcare fails to prevent progression

Objectives There is a growing need to evaluate the performance status of the activities of daily living (ADL) of the elderly in the rapidly aging Japanese society. The purpose of this study was to verify the usefulness of our new scoring sheet for assessing present ADL status and to clarify whether or not the assessed ADL status can predict the future risk of adverse conditions related to falls. Methods The validation study was performed using 116 non-handicapped community-dwelling Japanese elderly at least 60 years of age. Of those subjects, 44 were also analyzed for the relationship between baseline ADL status and subsequent risk of adverse conditions related to falls. Results The daily living performance score sheet had good internal consistency, with a Cronbach's alpha of 0.82 and a sequential hierarchical structure that reflected the difficulty of the activities. The total score was significantly and positively associated with six of eight subscale scores on the Short-Form 36-Item Health Survey (P \ 0.01). In the follow-up study, every one-point decrease in total score was significantly associated with a 39% elevated risk of a stumble or fall (P = 0.022) and also borderline significantly associated with higher risks of a fall, anxiety while walking indoors, and anxiety while walking outdoors (P \ 0.10). Conclusion Our new scoring sheet can reliably and comprehensively assess present ADL status. The assessed ADL could predict the future risk of adverse conditions related to falls.

No abstract

No abstract