Judith Haber, Jessamin Cipollina
Oral Health Nursing Education and Practice Program: Ten-Year Outcomes
Policy, politics & nursing practice
identifying populationlevel prevalence disability group prerequisite monitoring inclusion society prevalence sociodemographic characteristics older adults communication disabilities cds well established literature study sought describe prevalence sociodemographic characteristics communitydwelling older adults experiencing difficulties understanding others understand communicating usual language conducted crosssectional analysis national health aging trends survey 2015 nationally representative survey medicare beneficiaries ages 65 years old n 7029 calculated survey weightadjusted prevalence estimates mutually exclusive subgroups hearing expressiveonly cognitive multiple cds aggregate anycd prevalence described raceethnicity age gender education marital status social network size federal poverty status supplemental insurance groups pearsons chisquared statistic used compare sociodemographic characteristics anycd nocd groups estimated 253 107 million communitydwelling older adults us experienced anycds 2015 approximately 199 84 million experienced one cd 56 24 million multiple older adults cds likely black race hispanic ethnicity compared older adults without cds black 101 vs 76 hispanic 125 vs 54 p 0001 also lower educational attainment less high school 310 vs 124 p 0001 lower poverty levels 100 federal poverty level 235 vs 111 p 0001 less social supports married 513 vs 610 p 0001 social network 1 person 453 vs 360 p 0001 proportion older adult population experiencing anycds large disproportionately represented underserved sociodemographic groups findings support greater inclusion anycds populationlevel efforts like national surveys public health goals health services community research aimed understanding addressing access needs older adults disabilities communication