Changes in psychological distress before and during the COVID-19 pandemic among older adults: the contribution of frailty transitions and multimorbidity

作者：Yi Wang, Peipei Fu, Jie Li, Zhengyue Jing, Qiong Wang, Dan Zhao, Chengchao Zhou · 发表于：Age and Ageing · 年份：2021 · DOI：10.1093/ageing/afab061 · 被引用次数：65 · 研究领域：Chronic Disease Management Strategies、Frailty in Older Adults、Aging and Gerontology Research

AIM: To investigate changes in psychological distress in community-dwelling older adults before and during the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic and the contribution of frailty transitions and multimorbidity in predicting the psychological distress. METHODS: Prospective repeated-measures cohort study on a sample of participants aged 60 and over. A total of 2, 785 respondents at the baseline (May 2019) were followed during the COVID-19 (August 2020). The changes in psychological distress before and during the COVID-19 were assessed using generalised estimation equations with adjusting for sex, age, education, economic status, marital status, tea drinking status, smoking status, alcohol drinking status, sedentary time, sleep quality and activities of daily living. RESULTS: The psychological distress of older people has significantly increased in August 2020 compared with May 2019. Both older adults who remained frail and transitioned into frail state reported more psychological distress during the COVID-19. Similarly, both pre-existing multimorbidity and emerging multimorbidity groups were associated with more psychological distress. The group of frailty progression who reported new emerging multimorbidity showed more increase in psychological distress in comparison with those who remained in the non-frail state who reported no multimorbidity. CONCLUSION: Psychological distress has increased among the community-dwelling older adults during the COVID-19 pandemic, and ...