Relationships between non-communicable disease, social isolation and frailty in community dwelling adults in later life: findings from the Hertfordshire Cohort Study

Bevilacqua, Gregorio; Jameson, Karen; Zhang, Jean; Bloom, Ilse; Fuggle, Nicholas R; Patel, Harnish P.; Ward, Kate A; Cooper, Cyrus; Dennison, Elaine

doi:10.1007/s40520-021-02026-3

Cited by 8 publications

(1 citation statement)

References 66 publications

(60 reference statements)

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“…via poorer mental health or wellbeing, lower physical activity, or higher tobacco and alcohol consumption) [11][12][13][14][15]. Further explanations involve reverse causality, whereby long-term health conditions or disabilities can impair people's ability to form or sustain relationships [16,17]. Nevertheless, the prevalence of a lack of social connection (9.2-14.4% of the global population are estimated to feel lonely and 25% of adults worldwide may be socially isolated) [18,19] and the associated mortality justify attempts to understand how each component impacts on mortality in order to develop targeted interventions (Table 1).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Social connection and mortality in UK Biobank: a prospective cohort analysis

Foster,

Gill,

Mair

et al. 2023

BMC Med

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Background Components of social connection are associated with mortality, but research examining their independent and combined effects in the same dataset is lacking. This study aimed to examine the independent and combined associations between functional and structural components of social connection and mortality. Methods Analysis of 458,146 participants with full data from the UK Biobank cohort linked to mortality registers. Social connection was assessed using two functional (frequency of ability to confide in someone close and often feeling lonely) and three structural (frequency of friends/family visits, weekly group activities, and living alone) component measures. Cox proportional hazard models were used to examine the associations with all-cause and cardiovascular disease (CVD) mortality. Results Over a median of 12.6 years (IQR 11.9–13.3) follow-up, 33,135 (7.2%) participants died, including 5112 (1.1%) CVD deaths. All social connection measures were independently associated with both outcomes. Friends/family visit frequencies < monthly were associated with a higher risk of mortality indicating a threshold effect. There were interactions between living alone and friends/family visits and between living alone and weekly group activity. For example, compared with daily friends/family visits-not living alone, there was higher all-cause mortality for daily visits-living alone (HR 1.19 [95% CI 1.12–1.26]), for never having visits-not living alone (1.33 [1.22–1.46]), and for never having visits-living alone (1.77 [1.61–1.95]). Never having friends/family visits whilst living alone potentially counteracted benefits from other components as mortality risks were highest for those reporting both never having visits and living alone regardless of weekly group activity or functional components. When all measures were combined into overall functional and structural components, there was an interaction between components: compared with participants defined as not isolated by both components, those considered isolated by both components had higher CVD mortality (HR 1.63 [1.51–1.76]) than each component alone (functional isolation 1.17 [1.06–1.29]; structural isolation 1.27 [1.18–1.36]). Conclusions This work suggests (1) a potential threshold effect for friends/family visits, (2) that those who live alone with additional concurrent markers of structural isolation may represent a high-risk population, (3) that beneficial associations for some types of social connection might not be felt when other types of social connection are absent, and (4) considering both functional and structural components of social connection may help to identify the most isolated in society.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Social connection and mortality in UK Biobank: a prospective cohort analysis

Foster,

Gill,

Mair

et al. 2023

BMC Med

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Professional competences to promote healthy ageing across the lifespan: a scoping review

Carrillo-Alvarez,

Rodríguez-Monforte,

Fernández-Jané

et al. 2023

Eur J Ageing

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As societies age, the development of resources and strategies that foster healthy ageing from the beginning of life become increasingly important. Social and healthcare professionals are key agents in this process; therefore, their training needs to be in agreement with societal needs. We performed a scoping review on professional competences for social and health workers to adequately promote healthy ageing throughout life, using the framework described by Arksey and O’Malley and the Joanna Briggs Institute Guidelines. A stakeholder consultation was held in each of the participating countries, in which 79 experts took part. Results show that current literature has been excessively focused on the older age and that more attention on how to work with younger population groups is needed. Likewise, not all disciplines have equally reflected on their role before this challenge and interprofessional approaches, despite showing promise, have not been sufficiently described. Based on our results, health and social professionals working to promote healthy ageing across the lifespan will need sound competences regarding person-centred communication, professional communication, technology applications, physiological and pathophysiological aspects of ageing, social and environmental aspects, cultural diversity, programs and policies, ethics, general and basic skills, context and self-management-related skills, health promotion and disease prevention skills, educational and research skills, leadership skills, technological skills and clinical reasoning. Further research should contribute to establishing which competences are more relevant to each discipline and at what level they should be taught, as well as how they can be best implemented to effectively transform health and social care systems.

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Nighttime sleep duration, daytime napping, and metabolic syndrome: findings from the China Health and Retirement Longitudinal Study

Kondracki

Sun

et al. 2021

Sleep Breath

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Relationships between non-communicable disease, social isolation and frailty in community dwelling adults in later life: findings from the Hertfordshire Cohort Study

Cited by 8 publications

References 66 publications

Social connection and mortality in UK Biobank: a prospective cohort analysis

Social connection and mortality in UK Biobank: a prospective cohort analysis

Professional competences to promote healthy ageing across the lifespan: a scoping review

Nighttime sleep duration, daytime napping, and metabolic syndrome: findings from the China Health and Retirement Longitudinal Study

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