Abstract
Objectives
Sarcopenia and chronic pain are geriatric syndromes that negatively impact the lives of older people. The aim of this study was to explore the relationship among sarcopenia, pain, and successful aging among older persons participating in the China Health and Retirement Longitudinal Study (CHARLS).
Design
Cohort study with a 2-year follow-up.
Setting and Participants|Data were derived from 2 waves of the CHARLS, and 4280 community-dwelling participants aged ≥ 60 years were included in the study
Methods
Sarcopenia status was defined according to the Asian Working Group for Sarcopenia 2019 (AWGS 2019) criteria. Successful aging was defined following Rowe and Kahn’s multidimensional model. Pain was assessed by a self-reported questionnaire. A generalized estimating equation (GEE) was used to examine the associations.
Results
Longitudinal results demonstrated that compared with no sarcopenia, possible sarcopenia [OR (95%CI): 0.600 (0.304~1.188)] was not significantly associated with successful aging. Pain only was strongly associated with successful aging [0.388 (0.251~0.600)], whereas the association between sarcopenia only and successful aging was weaker [0.509 (0.287~0.905)]. The likelihood of being successful aging was substantially lower in the presence of coexisting sarcopenia and pain [0.268 (0.108~0.759)].
Conclusions
Both pain and sarcopenia are significant predictors for achieving successful aging among community-dwelling older adults. Early identification of sarcopenia and pain permits the implementation of treatment strategies and presents an opportunity to mitigate the risk of being unsuccessful aging.
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Funding
Funding statement: This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 82003448).
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Conflict of interest: None.
Ethic consideration: The CHARLS study has gotten the approval for interviewing respondents and collecting data by the Biomedical Ethics Review Committee of Peking University (IRB00001052–11015), and the informed consent was required to sign by the respondents.
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Zhu, X., Zhang, X., Ding, L. et al. Associations of Pain and Sarcopenia with Successful Aging among Older People in China: Evidence from CHARLS. J Nutr Health Aging 27, 196–201 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12603-023-1892-2
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12603-023-1892-2