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Falls and life-space mobility: longitudinal analysis from The International Mobility in Aging Study

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Abstract

Objectives

To investigate a 4-year longitudinal relationship between falls, recurrent falls, and injurious falls, according to different levels of life-space mobility (LSM).

Methods

Longitudinal analysis of an international cohort study. The participants were older adults from the International Mobility in Aging Study (IMIAS) aged between 65 and 74 years at baseline. Three waves of data (2012, 2014, 2016) were used. Fall history during the past year was recorded. Recurrent fallers were identified as those who fell at least twice and injurious fallers as participants who required medical attention. LSM measurements included Total Life-Space (LS-C), Maximal Life-Space (LS-M), Assisted Life-Space (LS-A), Independent Life-Space (LS-I) and Restricted Life-space (LS-ID) scores. Generalized estimation equation (GEE) models were used to determine whether life-space mobility measures and their change over time differed between recurrence of falls and injurious falls.

Results

At baseline, the prevalence of falls in the last year was 28%. 11.8% reported recurrent falls and 2.6% had serious injurious falls in the last year preceding the assessments. Recurrent fallers were more likely to be female, with insufficient income and, with comorbidities. GEE models showed that life-space mobility was lower among those with recurrent falls or serious injurious falls compared to those who never fell, but the rate of change did not differ over the 4-year follow-up except for the LS-A and LS-I scores, where some improvements were observed over time.

Conclusions and implications

Falls were independently associated with a decrease in LSM over 4 years. Targeting older adults with recurrent and injurious falls with appropriate interventions may improve community mobility and social participation.

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported by The Canadian Institutes of Health, Grant number AAM 108751. The funder had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript. We are grateful to all the older adults who have given their time and confidence to this research. We would also like to thank our universities and institutes for providing continuous support and our funding sources: The Canadian Institutes of Health Research.

Funding

This work was supported by The Canadian Institutes of Health Research (Grant AAM 108751).

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Rehabilitation Therapy, Queen’s University, Kingston, ON, Canada

    Tamer Ahmed & Mohammad Auais

  2. Research Group in Geriatrics and Gerontology, Faculty of Health Sciences, Universidad de Caldas, Manizales, Colombia

    Carmen-Lucia Curcio & Fernando Gomez

  3. Department of Health Sciences, Lakehead University, Thunder Bay, ON, Canada

    Afshin Vafaei

  4. Office of Public Health Studies, University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa, Honolulu, USA

    Catherine M. Pirkle

  5. Department of Physical Therapy, Federal University of Rio Grande do Norte, Natal, Brazil

    Ricardo Oliveira Guerra

  6. Department of Community Health Sciences, Centre de Recherche, Hôpital Charles Le Moyne, Université de Sherbrooke, Longueuil, QC, Canada

    Tamer Ahmed

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  1. Tamer Ahmed
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  2. Carmen-Lucia Curcio
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  3. Mohammad Auais
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  4. Afshin Vafaei
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  6. Ricardo Oliveira Guerra
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  7. Fernando Gomez
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Correspondence to Tamer Ahmed.

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The authors declare that there are no conflicts of interest.

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All procedures performed in studies involving human participants were in accordance with the ethical standards of the institutional and/or national research committee and with the 1964 Helsinki Declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards. This study was approved by the ethics committees of each site.

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Written informed consent was obtained from all subjects before their participation.

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Ahmed, T., Curcio, CL., Auais, M. et al. Falls and life-space mobility: longitudinal analysis from The International Mobility in Aging Study. Aging Clin Exp Res 33, 303–310 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s40520-020-01540-0

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s40520-020-01540-0

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