Self-Rated Health Among Very Old People in European Countries

Abstract

Objectives: To explore and gain insight into factors related to self-rated health (SRH) among very old people in two European countries. Methods: The study was based on Latvian (n = 301) and Swedish (n = 397) data from the baseline of the Enabling Autonomy, Participation, and Well-Being in Old Age: The Home Environment as a Determinant for Healthy Ageing Survey Study. Besides descriptive statistics, ordinal regression analysis was used to analyze demographic, physical and mental health-related, functional and environmental factors related to SRH in each sample. Results: In both samples, participants with worse perceived physical mobility and more symptoms were significantly more likely to have worse SRH. There were more diverse results regarding other factors in terms of opposite relations to SRH, comparing the two samples. Discussion: Preventive measures and health care should focus on improving and supporting mobility and physical health among older people. Especially in countries with low scores on indicators of health such as Latvia, to minimize health inequalities. More attention should be paid to factors to improve the general health status of the population.

Self-rated health and associated factors among the oldest-old: results from a cross-sectional study in Sweden

“…Incidence of impaired physical mobility increases with age [5]. Some previous studies have investigated physical mobility and SRH and have found an association [15,23]. There was a strong association between impaired physical mobility and SRH in our study, which highlights the importance of improving and maintaining physical mobility among the oldest-old.…”

“…The relative stability found in SRH may indicate that with increasing age older people adapt to their worsening health condition [17] or it may be due to higher mortality and higher non-response among the participants with poorest SRH [28]. Yet, relatively high proportions of good SRH among the oldest-old have even been reported in other studies [19,21,23].…”

“…Some studies have reported that socioeconomic differences in SRH persist in very old age [20] whereas others have found that this effect decreases with age [9]. In the oldest old, previous studies have investigated the level [21] or trends in SRH [6], socioeconomic differences in SRH [9,20], associations between SRH and health problems and functional status [8,9,22,23] and included educational level, income, marital status and social support as contributing factors [23]. But studies covering a broader range of contributing factors, including lifestyle factors, in this age group are, to our knowledge, lacking.…”

Social, clinical and psychometric factors affecting self-rated oral health, self-rated health and well-being in elders

“…The Home Environment as a Determinant for Healthy Aging" based on Latvian and Swedish data showed that poor perceived mobility was associated with poor SRH, while education was a determinant of SRH only for the Latvian sample. Age was not a significant determinant for either population [50]. Our results showed that for dentate participants, age was significantly associated with SROH and SWL (p=0.001); however, the findings for SRH were not significant, in accordance with the Latvian and Swedish data, as reported by Harschel et al, 2015.…”

“…Age was not a significant determinant for either population [50]. Our results showed that for dentate participants, age was significantly associated with SROH and SWL (p=0.001); however, the findings for SRH were not significant, in accordance with the Latvian and Swedish data, as reported by Harschel et al, 2015. In the present study, education, income and occupation were statistically significantly associated with both SROH and SRH (p=0.01).…”