Personal Experience Of Middle-aged And Elderly People With Knee Osteoarthritis And Its Influence On Their Daily Activities

Objective: The purpose of this study was to understand the personal experience of middle-aged and elderly patients with knee osteoarthritis as well as the impact of knee osteoarthritis on their daily activities, and to explore the factors causing such impact. Our goal is to alleviate or relieve the patient’s sufferings and improve the quality of their life at the same time.Methods: The combination of quantitative research and qualitative research is adopted in this study. The quantitative research was a cross sectional descriptive study. Between 3/2014 and 9/2014, 136 out-patients with knee osteoarthritis were selected from a top-grade class-A hospital in Shijiazhuang with convenience sampling, and then these samples were evaluated with the Self-designed General Condition Questionnaire and the Western Ontario and Mc Master Universities Osteoarthritis Index scale. Moreover, between 3/2014 and 12/2014, a total of nine informants were interviewed with purposive sampling. The content of the semi-structured interviews were transcribed verbatim into the narrative form and then analyzed with Colaizzi’s phenomenological method.Results: Results of quantitative research1 Present situation of daily activities of the middle-aged and elderly patients with knee osteoarthritisA total of 89 patients(65.44%) had severe difficulty in performing daily activities, which accounted for more than half, while those with little difficulty was 47 cases(34.56%).They had trouble in squatting,descending or ascending stairs,getting in or out of the bus, heavy domestic duties and walking on a flat surface.2 Factors that affect daily activities of the middle-aged and elderly patients with knee osteoarthritisUnivariate analysis showed that there was a significant difference in daily activities score of middle-aged and elderly patients with different ages, BMI, literacy, durations of disease, numbers of symptoms, exercise conditions, using conditions of auxiliary equipment and conditions of wearing high heels. What’s more, daily activities score had an increasing tendency with the increase of age, BMI, disease duration, number of symptoms, using of auxiliary equipment and wearing high heels. However, there was no statistical significance among gender, occupation, living conditions, diseased parts, treatment measures, injury, calcium supplements and warming measures, etc. Binary logistic regression analysis indicated that BMI and number of symptoms were the independent risk factors. The results of qualitative researchThe four main themes were classified as: Unfamiliar with KOA, self-feelings of KOA, impact of KOA on daily life and self-regulation. Theme1.Unfamiliar with KOA 1.1— The early symptom of KOA was ignored: They didn’t care about the early symptom of KOA,while thought it a natural thing. 1.2—Guess the reasons of KOA: They didn’t understand why they had KOA, and they suspected that the reasons were overwork, coldness, injury and degradation. Theme2 Self-feelings of KOA, 2.1—Description of symptoms: In the process of dealing with KOA, pain was a central part of life experience, followed by muscle weakness and stiffness. 2.2—Couldn’t control the KOA: The interviewees felt disappointed about KOA and couldn’t control it, then “accepted” it eventually. 2.3—Major concerns: They worried about falling, the side effects of medicine and feared to be a disability in the future. Theme 3—Impact of KOA on daily life 3.1—Activity limitation: Dysbasia; they couldn’t do the heavy housework; they couldn’t stand to take a shower for a long time, and had to sit when went to the toilet. 3.2—Mood disorders: Anger,depression, helplessness 3.3—Poor quality of sleep: They had difficulty in falling asleep, and had a short sleep time. Theme 4—Self-regulation 4.1— Self-management of knee symptoms: Keep warm, self-massage, rest and change posture. 4.2—Change the lifestyle: Pay attention to nutrition,change the ways of exercises,use auxiliary equipment and avoid lift heavy objects. 4.3—Adjust emotion.Conclusion:1 More than half of middle-aged and elderly people with KOA has severe difficulty in daily activities. Moreover, the most difficult activities include squatting, descending or ascending stairs,getting in or out of the bus, followed by heavy domestic duties and walking on a flat surface.2 Factors that affect daily activities of the middle-aged and elderly patients with knee osteoarthritis are ages, BMI, literacy, duration of disease, numbers of symptoms, exercise conditions, using conditions of auxiliary equipment and conditions of wearing high heels. Among these factors,BMI and numbers of symptoms are independent risk factors.3 The participant ignore KOA initially and stop the treatment process with their wishes.Normally they adopt self adjustment, lacking of professional guidance about KOA.