5 Common Health Concerns for Older Adults

An unfortunate side effect of life is that our health begins to deteriorate the older we get. It’s imperative that as you get older, you regularly see your primary care doctor in Portland or a local physician in your community. The state of your health can change in nearly an instant, so it’s best to have your general practitioner perform physicals on a somewhat regular basis.

As you can imagine, or maybe you’re already dealing with this, your hearing can certainly deteriorate as you get older. If you’re wondering about your hearing health, there is a test for that. So meet with an audiologist to determine the health of your hearing.

Besides that, there are at least five other health concerns for older adults. We will talk about them in greater detail below. So stick around to discover these five critical health areas.

1. Alzheimer’s Disease

According to the CDC, Alzheimer’s disease claims about 100,000 senior citizens over the age of 65 every year in America. Unfortunately, the prognosis is getting worse. Roughly 11% of the people over the age of 65 – one in nine to be more specific – suffer from this debilitating disease.

Obviously, it makes sense to have your primary care doctor keep a close eye on this condition if it’s potentially going to be a problem for you. There are safety issues to keep in mind, self-care will become difficult, and you may even need to make plans to put yourself in a residential facility or nursing home. (1)

2. Osteoporosis

Medical trends are always changing but one thing has been clear in recent years and it’s this: older adults tend to suffer more from the debilitating effects of osteoporosis. There are many contributing factors to this disease, but ultimately you’ll become less mobile and some people become partially or completely disabled.

If you are 50 years of age or older, have your doctor look into your bone mass. Osteoporosis and low bone mass, unfortunately, makes it easier for senior citizens and older adults to potentially break or fracture their bones, which creates a quality of life a lot less than desirable.

3. Diabetes

Based on another estimate from the CDC, they have determined that out of the senior citizens 65 years of age and older, roughly 25% of them are currently living with diabetes. In this age group, diabetes becomes a major health risk and is the cause of more than 50,000 deaths in the senior citizen population each year.

If your doctor determines you are a diabetic, you need to make changes to improve your health outlook and control this disease. The sooner you get your diabetes under control, the better your health picture will become.

4. Falling

Although falling technically isn’t a health problem, it’s an issue that many older adults face each year and it’s becoming more and more prevalent. Believe it or not, emergency room visits by older adults due to falling has increased. In fact, it’s estimated that 2 ½ million people in the senior citizen age bracket will visit the emergency room each year because they fell down.

5. Arthritis

Older adults suffer from arthritis big time. In fact, those 65 years of age or older struggle with arthritis more than any other condition. Talk with your doctor about this disease because you need to stay active as you get older and arthritis usually discourages activity, so you need to come up with a plan to maintain a healthy active lifestyle.

In Closing…

It should be very clear that older adults need to be cautious about their health. Make it a point to regularly see your primary care physician for checkups and meet with specialists to help overcome or manage specific health problems. (2)

Author Bio:

Airto Zamorano is the CEO and Co-Founder of Numana SEO and Numana Medical. He is an experienced business leader and digital marketer with a track record of success.