Dor crônica em idosos: estudo populacional em uma metrópole da região centro-oeste do Brasil ; Chronic pain in the elderly: a study population in a metropolis of the west central region of Brazil

Chronic pain is an unpleasant experience that reaches much of the world's population; however, population studies with the elderly are rare. The aim of this study was to assess chronic pain and self-rated health among community elders. Study population-based cross-sectional, in Goiania, Goias, December/2009 between April 2010 and. For this cut, we excluded those who reached  13 on the MEEM scores, and needed help for the answers. The random sample consisted of 872 participants. Chronic pain was considered as existing for six months or more. Pain intensity was measured by using a numeric scale (0-10: zero=no pain, 1,2,3,4=mild, 5.6=moderate, and strong=7,8,9, and 10=worst pain possible) the location investigated through body diagrams, and self-rated health assessed by the scale of verbal descriptors ("very good", "good," "regular," "bad," "worst"). The project was approved by the CEP/UFG (Protocol 050/2009) and seniors signed the Informed Consent. The data were analyzed using Stata version 8.0 and operated by means of absolute and relative frequency and Confidence Interval (95%). Of the 872 elderly, 460 (52.7%: 95% CI: 49.4% -56.1%) reported chronic pain. By age, the prevalence was 52.4, 53.1 and 53.0%, respectively, among young elderly (60-69 years), elderly (70-79 years) and very elderly (80 or +). Women obtained higher prevalence of chronic pain (60.4%) than men (40.1%), prevailing among the young elderly (57.6/43.4%), elderly (62.8/38.6%) and very elderly (64.5/33.9%). The elderly with chronic pain, 49.8% were young elderly, 33.0% and 17.2% very elderly seniors. The increased representation of women was (71.3%), and 48.8% were young elderly, 32.9% and 18.3% elderly, very elderly. The marriage prevailed among young elderly (46.0%) and elderly (54.1%) and widowed (55.7%), among the very elderly. Income  minimum wage prevailed among the 3 elderly age groups (32.1; 56.4; 50.7%) and education "primary" among young elderly (48.0%), elderly (45.7%) and very elderly (53.9%). The sites of pain were prevalent: MMII ...