THE RELATIONSHIP OF VISUAL AND HEARING IMPAIRMENTS TO DISABILITY - ANANALYSIS USING THE LONGITUDINAL-STUDY OF AGING

Background. Little is known about the relationships of visual impairme nt and hearing impairments to physical disability. The purpose of this work is to determine if persons 70 years of age and over with these i mpairments are at risk for increased disability in basic physical acti vities of daily living (ADLs) compared to persons without these impair ments. Methods. We used as our data source the baseline (1984) and the 1988 reinterview from the Longitudinal Study of Aging, a nationally r epresentative survey of noninstitutionalized persons 70 years of age a nd older. To determine the relationships of visual impairment and hear ing impairment to future four-year disability, we used multiple variab le modeling, controlling for demographic variables, selected chronic c onditions, and baseline disability. Results. Persons with visual impai rment were 1.37 (95%CI: 1.20-1.57) times more likely to have increased disability in ADLs than those without visual impairment. Hearing impa irment was not independently related to increased ADL disability. Conc lusions. Visual impairment by itself is an independent risk factor for future ADL disability. In light of the enlarging older population, ma neuvers to ameliorate visual impairment may help to minimize the incre ase in numbers of disabled persons.