Physical activity and quality of life in Argentinian older adults: a cross-sectional study

Abstract

The world's population is ageing progressively, necessitating an understanding of the needs of older people to improve their quality of life, particularly through physical activity. Currently, the actual levels of physical exercise in this population are unknown, as well as the levels of quality of life and dependency in many regions of the world. Therefore, the main objective was to analyse the physical activity levels of older adults, as well as the association of exercise on their quality of life. For this purpose, 344 older adults from the Autonomous City of Buenos Aires (Argentina) answered an ad-hoc questionnaire developed by a committee of experts and based on validated tools on physical exercise, dependence and quality of life. The main findings were that 34.6% of the population did not engage in weekly physical activity, a large part of the population showed a high level of independence, and a positive association was found between more active people and higher levels of quality of life. Based on these findings, new community physical exercise strategies should be designed and implemented to increase levels of quality of life and independence by increasing the volume and frequency of physical exercise in older people, especially done collectively.