Abstract:

The study aimed to describe the prevalence of geriatric syndromes among older adults living in the community. Also, we evaluated the relationship between frailty and socio demographic factors and other geriatric syndromes in the Central Mahalapye sub-district, Botswana. This was a cross-sectional study that recruited 414 older adults from the community using the Botswana Pension Office’s roster. We employed a systematic random selection method to recruit 160 older adults in three main villages and we randomly chose 150 elderly individuals in 10 research villages also randomly selected using Microsoft Office. We used the brief-assessment-tool-for-comprehensive-geriatric-assessment to collect information about geriatric syndromes. We conducted a multivariate analysis using binary logistic regression to determine the relationship between the independent variables (sociodemographic factors and other geriatric disorders) and frailty. Most of older adults had geriatric syndromes, particularly Instrumental-Activity-of-Daily-Living impairment (n= 328, 79.2%). About half of the participants were at nutrition risk (n= 261, 63.0%)), had a mood disorder/ depression (n= 237, 57.2%), had visual impairment (n= 245, 59.2%), or were frail (n= 219, 47.1%). In approximately one-third of cases, participants reported hearing impairment (n= 127, 30.7%) or having experienced at least one fall in the past year (n= 117, 28.3%). Factors such as high education level, living with a partner, urinary incontinence, and cognitive impairment influenced frailty (p<0.05). We intend to explore the potential impact of family size (despite pension allowance), alcohol consumption, oral health issues, and tooth loss on the nutritional vulnerability of elderly individuals in Sub-Saharan Africa, with a particular emphasis on Botswana.

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