94% of researchers rate our articles as excellent or good
Learn more about the work of our research integrity team to safeguard the quality of each article we publish.
Find out more
ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Aging Neurosci.
Sec. Neurocognitive Aging and Behavior
Volume 17 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fnagi.2025.1534824
This article is part of the Research Topic The Open Challenges of Cognitive Frailty: Risk Factors, Neuropsychological Profiles and Psychometric Assessment for Healthy Aging View all 16 articles
Prevalence and related factors for physical function and cognitive impairment among older adults: A population-based regional cross-sectional study
Provisionally accepted- Guangdong Provincial People's Hospital, Guangzhou, China
As the country with the largest and fastest-aging older population worldwide, China has hosted an increasing number of regional investigations of disability in older adults. However, the disability prevalence related to physical function and cognition in southern China is unknown. This study aimed to determine the prevalence of and associated factors for cognitive and physical-function impairment in persons 60 years or older. Methods: For this population-based cross-sectional study design, a total of 5603 participants were recruited between June 2021 to December 2022, using multistage, stratified, cluster-sampling procedure. Instruments including general questionnaire, basic and instrumental activities of daily life, Chinese version of mini-mental state examination, patient health questionnaire-9 and generalized anxiety disorder-7 were used to collect data in the form of WetChat mini program. Binary and multivariate logistic regression analysis were applied to explore the influencing factors.The prevalence of physical function and cognitive impairment in older adults was 37.3% and 31.0%, respectively. Multivariate regression analyses revealed that age, family income, education level, place of residence, medication type, annual physical examination, weekly social activities, care from family or friends, hearing disorder, walking disorder and depression were all associated with physical function and cognitive impairment. Moreover, an increased risk of physical function impairment was associated with BMI, region, income source, smoking and weekly exercise, and cognitive impairment was associated with the number of children, insurance type, coronary heart disease and anxiety. Physical function (OR: 1.79, 95%CI: 1.49, 2.16) and cognitive impairment (OR: 1.83, 95%CI: 1.51, 2.21) were mutually influenced in our study.This study showed a high prevalence of and several related factors for physical function and cognitive impairment. The results revealed that comprehensive and systematic prevention and control programs for disability should be established to improve the quality of life of older adults.
Keywords: physical function, cognitive impairment, older adults, A population-based regional cross-sectional study, Prevalence and related factors
Received: 26 Nov 2024; Accepted: 27 Feb 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Zhang, Cheng, Chen, Wang, Lin, Huang, Guo, Gong and Tiemei. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence:
Shen Tiemei, Guangdong Provincial People's Hospital, Guangzhou, China
Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.