Centre for Policy on Ageing



Functional decline in older adults — expanding methods of ascertainment
Author(s)	Linda P Fried, Karen Bandeen-Roche, Jeff D Williamson
Journal title	The Journals of Gerontology Series A: Biological Sciences and Medical Sciences, vol 51A, no 5, September 1996
Pages	pp M206-M214
Keywords	Self care capacity ; Mobility ; Evaluation ; Cross sectional surveys ; United States of America.
Annotation	In this cross-sectional, observational study in a group aged 59 and over, self-reported difficulty and dependency in each of 27 tasks of daily life were assessed as the measure of disability. Those without difficulty were evaluated for other functional change, by self-report, defined as either modification of method, or decreased frequency of task performance, when due to health rather than change in social circumstances. Prevalence, test-retest reliability, construct, and criterion validity were evaluated. The data indicate that more people have functional decrements by objective tests, than just those who report difficulty or inability to do a task. This study offers a new self-report method for ascertaining functional changes in older adults, and could also provide a basis for screening 'pre-clinical disability' and targeted interventions to prevent onset of disability.
Accession Number	CPA-970707004 A
Classmark	CA: C4: 4C: 3KB: 7T
Data © Centre for Policy on Ageing

...from the Ageinfo database published by Centre for Policy on Ageing.