Abstract
BackgroundOlder people represent a significant proportion of overseas travellers. The epidemiology of older international travellers is not well described in the literature. This study aims to identify demographics, travel characteristics and the medical profile of older travellers seeking pre-travel health advice in a specialist travel medicine clinic.MethodsRecords of travellers aged 60 years and older attending the Tropical Medical Bureau clinic in Galway, Ireland between 2014 and 2018 were examined. Descriptive and inferential analysis of data was performed.ResultsA total of 337 older travellers sought pre-travel health advice during the study period. The mean age of the cohort was 65.42 (±10) years. Most of the travellers (n = 267, 80%) had at least one travelling companion. Nearly half of older travellers (n = 155, 46.8%) were travelling with a single companion. Tourism was the main reason for travel for the majority (n = 260, 77.6%), followed by visiting friends and relatives (VFR) (n = 23, 6.9%) travellers. The mean interval remaining before the planned trip was 4.36 (±2) weeks, and the mean duration of travel was 3.16 (±1) weeks. The most popular single country of destination was India with 33 (9.8%) visitors, and South East Asia was the most popular region with 132 (39.2%) older travellers. The majority of travellers (n = 267, 79.2%) had a documented pre-existing medical condition. The most commonly reported medical conditions were hypertension (n = 26, 7.7%), dyslipidaemia (n = 18, 5.3%), diabetes mellitus (n = 12, 3.5%), insect bite sensitivity (n = 11, 3.3%), and hypothyroidism (n = 9, 2.6%). Antihypertensive agents (n = 32, 9.4%) and statins (n = 24, 7.1%) were the most frequently used medications. Typhoid (n = 112, 33.2%) and hepatitis A (n = 84, 24.9%) were the most common vaccinations administered to older travellers at the clinic.ConclusionsThis study provides an insight into the demographics, travel characteristics, and medical profile of elderly travellers seeking advice at a large travel clinic in Ireland. A wide range of travel destinations, diseases and medication use was reported among this group of travellers, which may enable travel medicine physicians to provide more tailored advice and to more appropriately counsel older travellers.
Highlights
Older people represent a significant proportion of overseas travellers
We found that 79% of travellers had a documented medical condition, which is higher than the 38–74% reported in previous studies [19, 31, 32]
The authors concluded that older travellers were more compliant with medical advice than younger travellers, they were at lower risk for illness exacerbation during travel
Summary
Older people represent a significant proportion of overseas travellers. The epidemiology of older international travellers is not well described in the literature. Darrat and Flaherty Tropical Diseases, Travel Medicine and Vaccines (2019) 5:17 have reported that the most common causes of death abroad were cardiovascular diseases, malignancies and trauma while infectious diseases were responsible for less than 10% of traveller deaths abroad [9,10,11,12,13,14] This information implies that underlying non-communicable diseases which occur commonly in the older age group should be optimised in advance of international travel. Older travellers are at higher risk of travel-associated morbidity and mortality This is because they are less able to adapt physiologically during journeys and less able to adjust to climatic extremes. This increases the risk of exacerbation of their chronic medical conditions and reduces older people’s immune response to travel vaccines [15]
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