More Than One-quarter of Seniors Living at Home Report Chronic Pain: StatsCan 

Canadian Press

February 21, 2008

Canada

More than one-quarter of Canadian seniors living in households and almost 40 per cent of those in institutions experience pain on a regular basis, says a Statistics Canada study released Thursday.

Not surprisingly, a high proportion of those with chronic pain found it had an impact on their quality of life. And it was associated with higher odds of being unhappy for those who had an increase in pain over a two-year period.

Researchers say this has implications as the boomers age. By 2031, an estimated 8.9 million to 9.4 million Canadians will be seniors.

"As a society we would hope that our seniors have good quality of life, and to look at that we need to look at what are the barriers to having a good quality of life and how can we remove those barriers," Statistics Canada senior analyst Pamela Ramage-Morin said from Ottawa.

"And certainly, the existence of pain seems to be a very large barrier."

Women were more likely than men to report chronic pain. Thirty-one per cent of women aged 65 and older living in households reported chronic pain compared with 21 per cent of men in that age group.

Dean Tripp, a professor of psychology and health at Queen's University in Kingston, Ont., said previous studies have found women are different than men when it comes to communicating distress.

For one thing, they find it easier to talk about their chronic pain, he suggested. And a host of biomedical reasons could be contributing because the physiologies and bodies of men and women differ, he noted.

Ramage-Morin said her study wasn't able to determine to what extent pain medication is being utilized and how well it's working.

For instance, the data captured whether or not a respondent was taking Aspirin, but it could not be determined whether it was being taken for pain or perhaps for a heart condition.

"It points to, really, a gap in the surveys or the literature in how we relate questions of pain and pain medication," said Ramage-Morin.

"Because it's certainly a concern amongst seniors ... because they often are taking a number of different medications for chronic diseases as well."

Future studies will take a closer look at examining the relationship between pain and pain medication and the effects on individuals, she said.

The purpose of this study was to provide national benchmarks for the prevalence of pain among seniors. For comparison purposes, it found that in the 18-64 age group, about 16 per cent of respondents experienced chronic pain.

Data were drawn from the National Population Health Surveys from 1995 to 2003, and from the 2005 Canadian Community Health Survey.

"Often in studies of seniors those who are in institutions are not included," Ramage-Morin noted. "It's a very difficult population to reach. So this is one of the strengths of this study, that we have institutionalized seniors, as well as those who are living in households."

Tripp said government is paying attention to issues related to aging, but "I'm not seeing us preparing like I would like to see us prepare."

Canada is facing an "age tsunami," he said, and needs to get ready for more people with chronic illnesses that cause pain.

Quality of life declines when people miss social engagements, networking and intimacy, and this can lead to depression.

"It's definitely not something that we should downplay," said Tripp. "It is significant and the reason we should pay a lot of attention to it is because it's treatable, even in the elderly."

Ramage-Morin said it appears seniors can cope with getting older and diseases that come along in their lives.

"But what is difficult to cope with is that ongoing pain," she said. "If we could reduce that pain, manage and control that pain well, then it would enhance quality of life for seniors."

Copyright © Global Action on Aging
Terms of Use  |  Privacy Policy  |  Contact Us