Loneliness and social isolation association with incidence of disability, dementia and mortality in Mexican older adults: three follow‐up years

Abstract

AbstractBackgroundLoneliness is defined as the feeling of being alone and can be considered as persistent, unavoidable and unpleasant. Social isolation is characterized by low frequency of contact with the social network, which may or may not include family members. The study of each of these entities is important because of their high frequency in OA and their association with negative outcomes as disability, dementia even mortality.MethodWe performed a secondary analysis of 1,668 adults aged 65 years or older, evaluated within Dementia Research Group 10/66 protocols in Mexico, after 3‐year follow‐up. Loneliness presence was assessed based on three questions included in the Geriatric Mental State Inventory (GMS): do you feel lonely, does this feeling of loneliness generate discomfort or sadness, can you avoid feeling lonely. Social isolation was identified by assessing friends, relatives and neighbors contact frequency; co‐residence; church attendance and social gatherings. Association of loneliness with and without emotional discomfort, as well as social isolation with incidence of disability, dementia, and mortality after three years of follow‐up was estimated using multivariate competing risk models.ResultLoneliness without emotional discomfort was about 35.4%, 24.0% reported loneliness with emotional discomfort, meanwhile social isolation prevalence was 41.1%. A differential distribution of loneliness with and without emotional discomfort, age groups and education by catchment area was observed (Table 2). After three years of follow‐up loneliness was found to be associated with incident dementia subHR = 1.5 (95%CI:1.1‐2.1), and social isolation with mortality, subHR = 1.5 (95%CI:1.1‐2.0).ConclusionAfter three years follow‐up one out 3 OA reported feeling lonely without emotional discomfort, 1 out 4 felt lonely with emotional discomfort, while 2 out 5 reported social isolation. Loneliness without emotional discomfort showed an association with dementia development, meanwhile social isolation was associated with mortality. Finally, no association was found between loneliness with emotional discomfort with disability, dementia or mortality in the analyzed sample.