Fatma Özkan Tuncay

Mobility disability and life satisfaction in elderly people

The objective of this descriptive and analytical study is to examine mobility disability and life satisfaction in elderly people living in nursing home residences and analyze the relationship between them. The study was conducted over 78 elderly people in two nursing home residences. The data of this study were obtained through a personal information form (PIF), the Rivermead mobility index (RMI) and the life satisfaction scale (LSS). It was detected that life satisfaction levels of elderly people were average, a great majority of them went through mobility disability and there was a significant correlation between mobility and life satisfaction. It was established that in elderly people mobility was affected by the age, gender and chronic diseases while life satisfaction was related to age, education level and health perception level. Disability is a factor that has a significant effect on the life satisfaction of elderly people. The findings of this study will be useful for planning interventions to improve mobility and satisfaction with life among nursing home elders in Turkey.

Disability in elderly patients with chronic neurological illness: Stroke, multiple sclerosis and epilepsy

The aim of the study was to evaluate disability in patients with elderly stroke, multiple sclerosis (MS) and epilepsy, and to analyze its relationship with demographic characteristics. We conducted a cross-sectional study involving 113 patients with neurological diseases. The data were collected with a Personal Information Form, the Rivermead Mobility Index (RMI), and the Brief Disability Questionnaire (BDQ) were used. The data were evaluated using percentage, variance analysis, the Kruskal-Wallis test and the Pearson correlation analysis. The study results demonstrate that among three disorders, the severity of disability increased in patients with stroke, epilepsy and MS, respectively. It was also found that in patients with stroke, MS and epilepsy experiencing disability in mobility, 32.7% had experienced moderate physical-social disability, and 63.3% had experienced severe physical-social disability, and that there was a significantly high relationship between mobility disability and physical-social disability. The severity of disability was found to be higher for older age, low level education, self-employed and widows. Especially in stroke patients, disability is a common problem in patients with epilepsy and MS. Detecting the level of disability is very important for decreasing the limitation in elderly patients with neurological illness.