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British Medical Bulletin Advance Access originally published online on February 15, 2008
British Medical Bulletin 2008 85(1):113-126; doi:10.1093/bmb/ldn003
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© The Author 2008. Published by Oxford University Press. All rights reserved. For permissions, please e-mail: journals.permissions@oxfordjournals.org

Quality of life in older ages

Gopalakrishnan Netuveli* and David Blane

Department of Primary Care and Social Medicine, Imperial College, London, UK

* Correspondence to: Dr Gopalakrishnan Netuveli, Department of Primary Care and Social Medicine, 3rd Floor, The Reynolds Building, St Dunstan's Road, London W6 8RP, UK E-mail: g.netuveli{at}imperial.ac.uk

Background: The quality of life of elderly people has become relevant with the demographic shift that has resulted in greying of population. There are indications that concepts and concerns related to quality of life in older ages are different from the general population.

Methods: A narrative review of selected literature.

Results: Quality of life is described often with both objective and subjective dimensions. The majority of the elderly people evaluate their quality of life positively on the basis of social contacts, dependency, health, material circumstances and social comparisons. Adaptation and resilience might play a part in maintaining good quality of life. Although there are no cultural differences in the subjective dimension of quality of life, in the objective dimension such differences exist. Two major factors to be considered with regard to quality of life in old age are dementia and depression.

Discussion: With all other influences controlled, ageing does not influence quality of life negatively; rather a long period of good quality of life is possible. Therefore, the maintenance and improvement quality of life should be included among the goals of clinical management.

Keywords: quality of life • ageing • adaptation • resilience • ethnic differences • dementia • depression • health-related • perceptions

Accepted for publication January 1, 2008.


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