A longitudinal study of the negative impact of falls on health, well-being, and survival in later life: the protective role of perceived control

Abstract

Objectives: Falls can have detrimental effects on older adults' psychological well-being, physical health, and survival rates. However, certain psychosocial mediators may lessen the negative impact of suffering a fall on health and well-being. Perceived control is a psychosocial factor that was examined as a mediator of the falls – health and well-being relationship in the current study.

Method: Participants were 232 community-dwelling older adults, age 68 or older who took part in a longitudinal study in 2008 and 2010 and completed measures of perceived control, self-rated health, health-care utilization, number of falls, depressive symptomology, and perceived stress. Survival was also tracked for seven years from 2008 through 2015.

Results: Older adults who suffered a fall had poorer health and well-being two years later compared to those who did not suffer a fall. Perceived control mediated the negative impact of falls on subsequent health and well-being outcomes two years later. Among older adults who experienced a fall, higher levels of perceived control predicted better subsequent health and well-being. Suffering one or more falls also predicted less likelihood of survival seven years later, beyond the effects of age, gender, marital status, and education.

Conclusion: Findings highlight the importance of assessing risk of falling and levels of perceived control in later life.

Keywords:

• Falls
• aging
• perceived control
• survival
• older adults

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Randall Family Scholarship and the Leifur Eiriksson Scholarship.