Long-standing and limiting long-standing illness in older people: associations with chronic diseases, psychosocial and environmental factors.

OBJECTIVE to examine the associations between domains of chronic diseases, social, psychological and environmental factors and long-standing and limiting long-standing illness among older people. DESIGN cross sectional survey. SETTING national sample living in private households. SUBJECTS 999 adults aged 65 years and over, mean age 73.2 years. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES self-reports of long-standing illness and limiting long-standing illness. RESULTS the prevalence of long-standing illness was 61.8% (95% CI 58.8, 64.9) and that for limiting long-standing illness was 40.0 (95% CI 38.0, 43.0). Strong associations between long-standing illness and circulatory disease, odds ratio: 2.23 (95% CI 1.63, 3.05) and musculoskeletal disorders, odds ratio: 3.21 (95% CI 2.35, 4.39) were found. In addition associations with other domains were observed. For example, feelings of vulnerability, odds ratio: 1.79 (95% CI, 1.28, 2.51) from the psychological domain and, having close relatives living close by, odds ratio: 1.52 (95% CI 1.11, 2.09) from the social domain. CONCLUSION the importance of considering a wide range of domains of human experience in the causation of limitations in society is emphasised. The currently dominant disease oriented view is insufficient to explain people's reported long-standing illness and limiting long-standing illness.