A review of quality-of-life in elderly osteoarthritis

ABSTRACT

Introduction

Osteoarthritis (OA) is the commonest joint disease in the world. Although aging is not invariably associated with OA, aging of the musculoskeletal system increases susceptibility to OA. Pain and reduced function due to OA, negatively impact health-related quality of life (HRQoL) in the elderly.

Areas covered

We searched PubMed and Google Scholar with search term “osteoarthritis’ combined with terms ‘elderly’ ‘ageing’ ‘healthrelated quality of life’ ‘burden’ “prevalence ‘hip osteoarthritis’ ‘knee osteoarthritis’ ‘hand osteoarthritis’ to identify relevant articles. This article discusses the global impact and joint-specific burden due to OA and the challenges in assessment of HRQoL in elderly with OA. We further describe some HRQoL determinants that particularly impact elderly persons with OA. These determinants include physical activity, falls, psychosocial consequences, sarcopaenia, sexual health, and incontinence. The usefulness of physical performance measures, as an adjunct to assessing HRQoL is explored. The review concludes by outlining strategies to improve HRQoL.

Expert opinion

Assessment of HRQoL in elderly with OA is mandatory if effective interventions/treatment are to be instituted. But existent HRQoL assessments have shortcomings when used in elderly§. It is recommended that determinants of QoL which are unique to the elderly, be examined with greater detail and weightage in future studies.

KEYWORDS:

• Aging
• elderly
• osteoarthritis
• pain
• quality of life

Article highlights

• This article provides a comprehensive review of issues pertaining to the quality of life in elderly persons with osteoarthritis.

• It discusses the challenges in the assessment of health-related quality of life in the elderly with OA.

• Health-related quality of life determinants unique to elderly persons with OA are examined, including physical activity, falls risk, psychosocial consequences, sarcopaenia, sexual health, incontinence.

• The review concludes by outlining strategies to improve the health-related quality of life in elderly persons.

Declaration of interest

DJ Hunter is employed by the University of Sydney and Royal North Shore Hospital. His salary support for the University of Sydney is supported by Arthritis Australia and an NHMRC Investigator Grant Leadership 2 (#1194737). D Hunter is the co-director of the Sydney Musculoskeletal Health Flagship. In addition, D Hunter is the editor of the osteoarthritis section for UpToDate and co-Editor in Chief of Osteoarthritis and Cartilage. DJH provides consulting advice on scientific advisory boards for Pfizer, Lilly, TLCBio, Novartis, Tissuegene, and Biobone. The authors have no other relevant affiliations or financial involvement with any organization or entity with a financial interest in or financial conflict with the subject matter or materials discussed in the manuscript apart from those disclosed.

Reviewer disclosures

Peer reviewers on this manuscript have no relevant financial or other relationships to disclose.

Additional information

Funding

This paper was not funded.