Prevalência, incidência, fatores preditivos e impacto das quedas entre as pessoas idosas no munícipio de São Paulo: uma  análise longitudinal

Abstract

Falls are accidental events, considered common in all phases of life. However, when it happens with aged people, these events are worrying because can cause fractures, immobility and functional declining, insecurity in going out or walk alone with consequent social isolation and possible depression, culminating, in most cases, with the need of institutionalization and even occurrence of death. These events results from a combination of physical, psychological, social and environmental factors that are present on aging process. This study aims to: verify the prevalence of falls between elderly in the city of São Paulo in 2000 and 2006, verify the incidence of falls in 2006 and its determinants factors, identify the elderly called "fallers", which means, elderly people which referred falls in 2000 and 2006, and its associated factors and to verify the impact of falls on the deaths occurrences in this group. This study is part of SABE Study-Saúde, Bem-Estar e Envelhecimento (Health, Well-being and Aging) and is characterized as a longitudinal, exploratory, descriptive research with quantitative approach. To verify the prevalence, elderly that referred fall during 12 months before the interview at the two moments of data collect were part of the sample, for the incidence, the elderly that not referred fall in 2000, but referred in 2006 and for the "fallers" the ones who referred falls in both periods concomitantly. To analyze the impact of falls on the mortality, it was considered the elderly that referred fall in 2000 and died between the two data collection. It was possible to verify the increase of the prevalence of falls from 28.6% to 31.1% in 2000 and 2006 respectively. The incidence of falls in 2006 was 19.7% and, among the analyzed variables, none of them was significant for female sex, and for male sex, the age (70 to 79 years old) and the presence of diseases represented RRR of 2.4 and 3.1 respectively. For the "fallers", the determinant factors were advanced old age (80 and more years old for both sex) and the presence of diseases (for women). The found RRR for age were 2.2 for women and 3.04 for men and the presence of diseases obtained RRR of 5.3 for women. It was yet verified that the falls increases the risk of deaths in a RRR of 1.4. These results reinforces the necessity of implementation of public politics focused on early prevention of this event in order to avoid it, since it can contribute not only with early deaths but to worst quality of life of the aged people.

Accuracy of Timed Up and Go Test for screening risk of falls among community-dwelling elderly

“…In Brazil, the prevalence of falls among the elderly in 2006 was 36.4% among women and 22.6% among men, whereas the incidence in the period between 2000 and 2006 was 22.7% among women and 14.9% among men 2 . There are numerous risk factors for falling in this population, such as muscle weakness, past history of falls, gait, balance, visual and cognitive impairment, osteoarthritis, depression and age greater than 80 years 3 .…”

Gait, posture and transfer assessment among elderly practitioners and non-practitioners of Tai Chi Chuan

“…It has been estimated that balance complaints affect 85% of the population over the age of 65 years [1,2] thereby leading to the loss of independence and autonomy. These complaints may result from health problems [1][2][3] such as falls, which form the main cause of fractures, particularly those of the femur [4]. Prevention of such problems is a major challenge for individuals, their families, healthcare professionals and public policy.…”

Alteração do equílibrio e marcha em idosos e ocorrência de quedas

“…Dentre os idosos do sexo masculino 42 sofreram queda correspondendo `a (46%) e no sexo feminino foram relatados uma incidência de quedas de (56%), e um valor de p igual a 0,17, totalizando 102 idosos que sofreram quedas, resultados semelhantes foram encontrados no estudode Siqueira et al (2007) eTelles, 2008. …”