A new comprehensive and international view on ageing: introducing the 'Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe'.
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ABSTRACT:
SUBMITTER: Borsch-Supan A
PROVIDER: S-EPMC5546288 | biostudies-other | 2005 Dec
REPOSITORIES: biostudies-other
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Project description:BackgroundA number of studies provide evidence for an association between psychosocial factors and risk of incident arthritis. Current evidence is largely limited to the examination of negative factors such as perceived stress, but positive factors such as subjective wellbeing may also play a role.PurposeThe purpose of the current study was to investigate whether people with higher subjective wellbeing have a lower risk of developing arthritis.MethodsWe used Cox proportional hazards regression to examine the prospective relationship between wellbeing (measured using the CASP-12) and incidence of arthritis over a 9-year period. The sample consisted of 13,594 participants aged ?50 years from the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe.ResultsThere was a significant association between greater wellbeing and reduced incident arthritis that was stronger at younger ages. In sex-adjusted analyses, for a standard deviation increase in CASP-12 score, the hazard ratios (95 % confidence intervals) for incident arthritis in people aged <65 and ?65 years were 0.73 (0.69-0.77) and 0.80 (0.77-0.85), respectively. After further adjustment for other established risk factors, these associations were attenuated but remained significant in both age groups: the fully adjusted hazard ratios were 0.82 (0.77-0.87) and 0.88 (0.82-0.95), respectively.ConclusionsThese results provide evidence for an association between greater wellbeing and reduced risk of incident arthritis and, more generally, support the theory that psychosocial factors are implicated in the aetiology of this disease. Future research needs to delineate the mechanisms underlying the association between wellbeing and arthritis risk.
| S-EPMC4869763 | biostudies-literature
Project description:ObjectivesTo examine the associations between health conditions and passive suicidal ideation in middle-aged and older adults.MethodMultivariate logistic regression analyses were conducted on data from 35,664 middle-aged and older adults from the Survey of Health, Ageing, and Retirement in Europe. Mediation analyses were also conducted to test the roles of disability and depression in risk of ideation.ResultsAfter including demographic variables, disability, depression, and other health conditions as covariates, heart attack, diabetes/high blood sugar, chronic lung disease, arthritis, ulcer, and hip/femoral fractures were associated with increased odds of passive suicidal ideation. When grouped by organ systems, conditions affecting the endocrine, respiratory, and musculoskeletal systems were associated with increased odds of passive suicidal ideation, as was the total number of conditions. Individuals with greater numbers of health conditions exhibited greater levels of disability and depression, which partially explained the increased risk of passive suicidal ideation among those with more health conditions.DiscussionCertain specific health conditions, as well as total number of conditions, are associated with passive suicidal ideation in middle age and older adulthood. Health is a critical risk factor for suicidal ideation in late life and should be further studied in this particularly at-risk population.
| S-EPMC4982388 | biostudies-literature
Project description:BackgroundPrevious studies indicate that psychosocial factors can impact COPD prevalence. However, research into this association has predominantly focused on negative factors such as depression. The aim of this study was to examine whether high subjective wellbeing is associated with a lower risk of developing COPD.MethodsThe sample consisted of 12,246 participants aged ?50 years from the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe. We used Cox proportional hazards regression to examine the relationship between wellbeing (measured using the CASP-12) and incidence of COPD over a follow-up period of 9 years.ResultsThere was a significant association between wellbeing and COPD risk. In age-adjusted analyses, a standard deviation increase in CASP-12 score was associated with a reduced risk of COPD; hazard ratios (95% confidence intervals) for men and women were 0.67 (0.60-0.75) and 0.80 (0.73-0.87) respectively. After additional adjustment for demographic and health behaviour variables, this association remained significant for men but not for women: the fully-adjusted hazard ratios were 0.80 (0.70-0.91) and 0.91 (0.82-1.03) respectively.ConclusionsGreater wellbeing is associated with a reduced risk of COPD, particularly in men. Future research is needed to establish whether gender reliably moderates this association.
| S-EPMC5519137 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Background and purposeVisual dysfunction is a non-motor symptom of Parkinson disease (PD), but its prevalence is unknown as population-based data on the epidemiology of visual symptoms in PD are lacking. The objective was to determine the prevalence of visual dysfunction in PD.MethodsThis was a cross-sectional analysis of data from adults ?50 years old in the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe (SHARE), a multinational population-based health survey of adults living in one of 27 European countries and Israel. PD diagnosis was self-reported. Impairment in overall, distance or near eyesight was defined as a score of 4 or 5 on a 1-5 scale. Adjusted logistic regression was used to determine the association between PD and self-reported vision.ResultsThere were 115 240 age-eligible participants in the SHARE study (mean age 64.3 years, 54% female), of whom 1438 (1.25%) reported a diagnosis of PD. In adjusted logistic regression models, PD was associated with increased odds of impaired overall [odds ratio (OR) 2.67, 95% confidence interval (CI) 1.91-3.72], distance (OR 2.55, 95% CI 2.04-3.19) and near (OR 2.07, 95% CI 1.69-2.55) eyesight. Individuals with PD were also less likely to report having an eye examination within the previous 2 years (OR 0.59, 95% CI 0.38-0.92), but this did not remain statistically significant after adjusting for confounders (OR 0.76, 95% CI 0.47-1.24).ConclusionsVisual dysfunction is significantly more common in PD than in the general adult population. Visual symptoms are a potentially under-recognized and under-treated source of reduced quality of life in PD patients that require further attention and study.
| S-EPMC7012725 | biostudies-literature
Project description:The link between greater wellbeing and longevity is well documented. The aim of the current study was to test whether this association is consistent across individualistic and collectivistic cultures. The sample consisted of 13,596 participants from 11 European countries, each of which was assigned an individualism score according to Hofstede et al.'s (Cultures and organizations: software of the mind, McGraw Hill, New York, 2010) cultural dimension of individualism. We tested whether individualism moderated the cross-sectional association between wellbeing and self-rated health or the longitudinal association between wellbeing and mortality risk. Our analysis revealed a significant interaction between individualism and wellbeing such that the association between wellbeing and self-rated health or risk of mortality from cardiovascular disease was stronger in more individualistic countries. However, the interaction between wellbeing and individualism was not significant in analysis predicting all-cause mortality. Further prospective studies are needed to confirm our finding and to explore the factors responsible for this culturally dependent effect.
| S-EPMC5765189 | biostudies-literature
Project description:ObjectivesA growing literature acknowledges the association between childhood socioeconomic status (SES) and health in late adulthood (i.e., 50+). Less, however, is known about the association with mental health outcomes, such as depression. We use the Survey on Health, Ageing, and Retirement in Europe (SHARE) to analyze overall and gender-specific associations between childhood SES and late-adulthood depression.MethodsUsing life history and contemporaneous data from 21,989 SHARE respondents in combination with principal component analysis we construct indices of childhood SES. We measure late-adulthood depression using the EURO-D scale. Contemporaneous SES is operationalized as the logarithm of household equivalized income. We estimate associations using linear regression models.ResultsWe document a positive association between childhood SES and the late-adulthood EURO-D score. The association persists even when allowing for contemporaneous SES. Zooming in on gender-specific associations reveals that the association for mental health is particularly pronounced for women.DiscussionOur findings reveal the long-term association between childhood socioeconomic conditions and depression later in life, which persists even after taking into account current socioeconomic conditions and are stronger for women than for men. These results imply that boosting childhood socioeconomic conditions can potentially have effects lasting well beyond the childhood phase.
| S-EPMC6941210 | biostudies-literature
Project description:OBJECTIVE:To examine time-dependent predictors of functional impairment in older adults in Europe longitudinally. METHODS:Data were derived from the Survey of Health Ageing, and Retirement in Europe (2004-2013). Functional impairment was assessed by using activities of daily living (ADL) and instrumental activities of daily living (IADL) indices. Fixed effects regressions were used to estimate the effects of sociodemographic factors (age, marital status, living situation, and income deciles (median split)), lifestyle factors (smoking status and alcohol consumption per week), depression, cognitive function and chronic diseases on the outcome variables. RESULTS:Longitudinal regressions revealed that functional impairment increased significantly with age, the occurrence of depression, cognitive impairment, the number of chronic conditions, and less than daily alcohol consumption in the total sample and in both sexes. Moreover, the onset of smoking and living without a spouse/partner in household increased functional impairment in the total sample. The effect of depression on functional impairment was significantly more pronounced in men. CONCLUSION:Our findings highlight the relevance of changes in age, depression, cognitive function, smoking and chronic diseases for functional impairment. Since particularly depression and smoking may be avoidable, developing strategies to prevent depression or stop smoking might be useful approaches to postpone functional impairment in older adults.
| S-EPMC4718586 | biostudies-literature
Project description:BackgroundA frailty paradigm would be useful in primary care to identify older people at risk, but appropriate metrics at that level are lacking. We created and validated a simple instrument for frailty screening in Europeans aged ?50. Our study is based on the first wave of the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe (SHARE, http://www.share-project.org), a large population-based survey conducted in 2004-2005 in twelve European countries.MethodsSubjectsSHARE Wave 1 respondents (17,304 females and 13,811 males).Measuresfive SHARE variables approximating Fried's frailty definition. Analyses (for each gender): 1) estimation of a discreet factor (DFactor) model based on the frailty variables using LatentGOLD. A single DFactor with three ordered levels or latent classes (i.e. non-frail, pre-frail and frail) was modelled; 2) the latent classes were characterised against a biopsychosocial range of Wave 1 variables; 3) the prospective mortality risk (unadjusted and age-adjusted) for each frailty class was established on those subjects with known mortality status at Wave 2 (2007-2008) (11,384 females and 9,163 males); 4) two web-based calculators were created for easy retrieval of a subject's frailty class given any five measurements.ResultsFemales: the DFactor model included 15,578 cases (standard R2 = 0.61). All five frailty indicators discriminated well (p < 0.001) between the three classes: non-frail (N = 10,420; 66.9%), pre-frail (N = 4,025; 25.8%), and frail (N = 1,133; 7.3%). Relative to the non-frail class, the age-adjusted Odds Ratio (with 95% Confidence Interval) for mortality at Wave 2 was 2.1 (1.4 - 3.0) in the pre-frail and 4.8 (3.1 - 7.4) in the frail. Males: 12,783 cases (standard R2 = 0.61, all frailty indicators had p < 0.001): non-frail (N = 10,517; 82.3%), pre-frail (N = 1,871; 14.6%), and frail (N = 395; 3.1%); age-adjusted OR (95% CI) for mortality: 3.0 (2.3 - 4.0) in the pre-frail, 6.9 (4.7 - 10.2) in the frail.ConclusionsThe SHARE Frailty Instrument has sufficient construct and predictive validity, and is readily and freely accessible via web calculators. To our knowledge, SHARE-FI represents the first European research effort towards a common frailty language at the community level.
| S-EPMC2939541 | biostudies-literature
Project description:ObjectivesTo test whether loneliness is associated with the risk of cognitive impairment up to 11 years later in a European sample of middle-aged and older adults. The study examines whether this association is independent of measures of social isolation, depression, and other risk factors for cognitive impairment and dementia.MethodsParticipants (N = 14 114) from the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe (SHARE) answered a single item on loneliness at baseline and were assessed for cognitive impairment every 2-to-3 years for 11 years. Participants who scored at least 1.5 standard deviations below the age-graded mean on both a memory recall task and verbal fluency task were classified as impaired. A three-item measure of loneliness was available for a sample of respondents followed up to 4 years.ResultsFeeling lonely was associated with increased risk of incident cognitive impairment (HR = 1.31, 95%CI = 1.19-1.44), after accounting for age, sex, education, and SHARE country strata. The association was robust but reduced in magnitude when controlling for clinical and behavioral risk factors, health-related activity limitations, social isolation, social disengagement, and depressive symptoms. The association was not moderated by socio-demographic factors and was also apparent when using the three-item loneliness scale instead of the single-item measure.ConclusionsThese findings expand the extant literature on loneliness and the risk of cognitive impairment in older adulthood. Loneliness is one modifiable factor that can be intervened prior to the development of severe impairment or dementia.
| S-EPMC7755119 | biostudies-literature
Project description:BackgroundActive and Healthy Ageing (AHA) is the process of optimizing opportunities related to health, participation, and safety in order to improve quality of life. The approach most often used to measure AHA is Rowe and Kahn's Satisfactory Ageing model. Nonetheless, this model has limitations. One of the strategic objectives of the WHO Global Strategy and Action Plan (2016) is to improve Healthy Ageing measurement. Our objectives were to compare two models of assessing AHA and further compare the results by country and sociodemographic variables.MethodsThis was a cross-sectional, observational analysis of a representative sample of the general population aged 50 years and older in Europe. The data analysed were obtained by the Study of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe (SHARE). The dependent variable was AHA and its dimensions, measured using the Rowe and Kahn AHA model (AHA-B) and the authors' model based on the WHO definition (AHA-BPS). A descriptive analysis and multivariate models of binary logistical regression were developed.ResultsThe sample consisted of 52,641 participants (mean age 65.24 years [SD = 10.18; Range = 50-104], 53.2% women). Healthy Ageing prevalence in the AHA-B model was 23.5% (95%CI = 23.1%-23.9%). In the AHA-BPS model, this prevalence was 38.9%. In both models, significant variations were observed between countries, and were distributed along a north-western to south-eastern gradient. The sociodemographic variables associated with the absence of AHA were advanced age, female sex, death of spouse, low educational level, lack of employment, and low financial status. Comparing the two models, the strength of association between absence of AHA and advanced age (85 years and older) was four times greater in the AHA-B model.ConclusionsOur results showing differences between these two models provide evidence that the AHA-BPS model does not penalize older age and is more likely to characterize AHA from a health promotion perspective.
| S-EPMC6205806 | biostudies-literature