There is no association between anxiety and lifestyle in older adults during the COVID-19 pandemic: A cross-sectional study.

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic has caused mental health problems worldwide. Older people have been particularly affected by the lockdown as their health conditions have changed, although they have been kept in isolation to avoid exposure to contagion. We sought to determine the association between lifestyles and anxiety in older adults during the COVID-19 pandemic. This study was cross-sectional. We enrolled 150 older adults of both sexes and with a history of chronic diseases from the municipality of El Agustino (Lima, Peru). The 20-item Geriatric Anxiety Scale and the 25-item Lifestyle Questionnaire on eating, physical activity, rest, and sleep were administered in Spanish during July-August 2021. The mean age was 70.8 ± 8.1 years, 54.7% were male, and 75.3% practiced exercise. During the COVID-19 pandemic, 99.3% of the elderly had healthy lifestyles and 40% presented anxiety (mild, moderate, and severe anxiety in 26.7%, 8.7%, and 4.7%, respectively). We found no association between anxiety and lifestyle (p = 0.189), physical exercise was a predictor of lifestyle (p < 0.001) and we did not find predictors of anxiety symptoms (p > 0.05). Our results suggest that there was no link between anxiety symptoms and lifestyle in older adults during the lockdown. It is important to conduct in-depth research on factors associated with anxiety symptoms among older residents in other regions, focusing on population groups with the highest rates of infection and death from COVID-19.