Research

Visual Acuity Thresholds Associated with Activity Limitations in the Elderly

Purpose: Activity Limitations, which induce loss of autonomy in the elderly, are a major public health problem. We investigated the associations between objectively determined visual impairments and activity limitations and assessed the visual acuity thresholds associated with these restrictions.

Methods: The study sample consisted of 1887 people aged 63 years and over from a population-based cohort. Moderate to severe visual impairment was defined as presenting visual acuity lower than 20/70, according to the World Health Organization (WHO) definition. In addition, we studied mild visual impairment, defined as visual acuity (20/70-20/40). Multivariate logistic regressions were used to estimate the associations between vision and instrumental activities of daily living (IADL) limitations. Using receiver-operating characteristic (ROC) curves, we identified visual acuity thresholds that maximized the Youden index ([sensitivity + specificity]-1) for predicting IADL limitations.

Publication date

July 14, 2015

Publication

Acta Ophthalmologica

Authors

Vincent Daien,Karine Peres, Max Villain, Alain Colvez, Isabelle Carriere, C
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