Perceived neighborhood characteristics and the functional performance of elderly people in the Belo Horizonte Metropolitan Area, Minas Gerais State, Brazil: a quantile regression analysis

Características percebidas da vizinhança e o desempenho funcional de pessoas idosas na Região Metropolitana de Belo Horizonte, Minas Gerais, Brasil: uma análise utilizando regressão quantílica

Características percibidas del vecindario y el desempeño funcional de personas mayores en la Región Metropolitana de Belo Horizonte, Minas Gerais, Brasil: un análisis utilizando regresión cuantílica

Abstract:

This study aims to examine the relationship between neighborhood characteristics and the functional performance of elderly people living in the Belo Horizonte metropolitan area, Minas Gerais State, Brazil. Data of a representative sample of 2,033 elderly were analyzed using quantile regression. Functional performance was measured by the number of activities of daily living (ADL) the elderly had difficulty to perform. The neighborhood characteristics evaluated were: maintenance, trust, insecurity and defective sidewalks. Functional performance was found positively associated with the characteristic defective sidewalks, whose effect increased as the number of ADL the elderly had difficulty to perform increased. The results suggest that inadequate sidewalk conditions can contribute to functional losses in elderly people, especially among those who are functionally more compromised.

Keywords:
Aged; Frail Elderly; Health of the Elderly