Citation

Aydoğan Z, Baş B, Aksoy S. Top. Geriatr. Rehabil. 2022; 38(4): 270-276.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2022, Lippincott Williams and Wilkins)

DOI

10.1097/TGR.0000000000000374

PMID

36349301

PMCID

PMC9632758

Abstract

This study was conducted with elderly individuals who had recovered from COVID-19 to investigate the effects of COVID-19 on balance, perception, attention, memory, and quality of life and produce rehabilitative solutions for these problems. MATERIAL AND METHOD: A total of 45 volunteers older than 65 years who had not had COVID-19 were included in group 1. A total of 45 volunteers older than 65 years who had recovered from COVID-19 were included in group 2 (elderly people who have had COVID-19 at least 6 months ago). After obtaining the individuals' demographic data, we conducted vestibular assessment for balance and administered the Stroop test for attention, the Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE), the digit span test for short-term memory, and a quality-of-life test.

RESULTS: Mean age of the individuals who had had COVID-19 was 68.24 ± 3.32 years, and the mean age of the individuals who had not had COVID-19 was 68.55 ± 3.34 years. There were statistically significant correlations between the two groups for the Stroop test (P <.05), MMSE (P <.05), the digit span test for perception and attention (P <.05), and the vestibular assessment quality-of-life test (P <.01). Sensory (P <.001), past, present, and future activities (P <.05), social participation (P <.001), and death (P <.05) were found to be significant in the total score (P <.001). The covariance analysis of elderly individuals who had had COVID-19 revealed that they performed significantly worse on the balance, perception, attention, memory, and quality-of-life tests than elderly individuals who had not had COVID-19.

CONCLUSION: The negative effects of COVID-19 were found among elderly individuals older than 65 years. We suggest that telerehabilitation should be developed for elderly people who have recovered from COVID-19 and that its effects investigated.

Language: en

Keywords

elderly; COVID-19; attention; memory; perception; quality of life