Aim: Ageing has become a global phenomenon in the 21st century leading to an increased life expectancy of older people. The elderly are vulnerable to chronic diseases, which are insidious in onset, which in turn lead to impairment and further with different types of disabilities. These disabilities affect the health related quality of life of the elderly with the rising burden on the health systems in developing countries such as in India. This study aimed to find the pattern of disability and find its association with various socio-demographic variables among elderly persons in a rural block of Odisha.

Materials & Method: The present cross sectional study was conducted among 22 villages of Barang block, Odisha using cluster random sampling method.800 elderly were recruited for the study and a pretested questionnaire using validated tools were used to assess speech, vision, locomotor and mental disability among elderly.

Result: The overall prevalence of disability was found to be 43.5%. In the current study the pattern of disability in the elderly was found to be 34.25% of vision, followed by mental disability 15.75%, hearing 11.63%, speech 9.62% and locomotor disability (11.5% in legs and 7.87% in the hands). Age, educational status and socioeconomic status were found to be significantly associated with disability among elderly in the study area (p<0.05).

Conclusion: Every elderly in rural setup should be made aware of how to live on disability by changing their lifestyle and modifiable risk factors. Elevated awareness on disability will let the elderly people help in voluntarily reporting for early prevention against any disability.

Keywords: Elderly, disability, rural.

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Dr Shalini Ray

Assistant Professor, Dept of Community Medicine, SGT Medical College, Gurgaon

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