Effectiveness of Exercise Program on Mobility, Activity of Daily Living and Quality of Life among Elderly Residing at Rural Area

Abstract

Introduction: Aging is considered as normal and natural process of every human being, and regarded
as an unavoidable biological happening. The ever changing dynamics of demographics have affected the
elderly at large; wherein the impact is enormous throughout world including the developing countries like
India. Elderly people face a variety of problems like inactivity, functional loss, psychiatric morbidity and
diminished quality of life. The scientific evidences highlight that practice of exercise program enhances
mobility, activity of daily living and quality of life. Thus the present communication was carried out to
assess the effectiveness of exercise program on mobility, activity of daily living and quality of life among
elderly.
Materials and Method: It’s a true experimental study, where post test only design with control group
was used among 150 randomly selected elderly people (75 was in control and 75 was in study group)
residing at rural area. The elderly above 60 years of age, able to perform exercise and willing to participate
(consent) were enrolled in the study. Structured interview schedule was used to assess the study variables.
The collected data was analyzed with help of descriptive and inferential statistics methods.
Results: The results revealed that elderly who received the exercise interventions had improved mean scores
on mobility and quality of life than the elderly who received the routine care, notably it was statistically
significant at p<0.05 level. A significant association was existed between mobility, quality of life with socio
demographic variables like age, gender and type of family at p<0.05 level.
Conclusion: This study demonstrated that exercise intervention was well accepted by elderly population
and has significant effect towards the improvement of mobility and enhancement of health related quality of
life. It should be emphasized that the practice of regular exercise programme for the reduction in physical
deformities and improved wellbeing and quality of life.