Morbidity Profile of Rural Geriatric Population in North India: A Community Based Cross-sectional Study.

ABSTRACT

The current cross-sectional study was conducted over a period of on eyear. Eight villages were chosen from Miran Sahib zone of R.S Pura block using simple random sampling. A pre-designed, pre-structured and validated questionnaire was applied to all persons aged ?60 Years. A total of 418 subjects (191 males and 227 females) comprised the study population.64.40% of the respondents belonged to 60-69 year age group. Among the morbidity distribution in the study population, visual impairment (54.06%) was the most common, followed by hypertension (35.89%), arthritis (34.21%), diabetes mellitus (12.92%) and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (5.50%). COPD was higher in males and arthritis was higher in females and the gender disease association was found to be statistically significant (p<0.05). The results have shown high morbidity in the study population especially of visual impairment and cardio-vascular diseases. Respiratory diseases especially COPD morbidity was higher in males, while arthritis morbidity was more in females.