Media Releases

Generalized anxiety disorder is three times more likely among older adults with COPD

February 3, 2016

Toron­to, ON – The preva­lence of past-year gen­er­al­ized anx­i­ety dis­or­der (GAD) for adults aged 50 and old­er with chron­ic obstruc­tive pul­monary dis­ease (COPD) is much high­er com­pared to old­er adults with­out COPD (5.8% vs 1.7%), accord­ing to a new study pub­lished by Uni­ver­si­ty of Toron­to researchers.

In a paper pub­lished online this week in COPD: Jour­nal of Chron­ic Obstruc­tive Pul­monary Dis­ease, inves­ti­ga­tors report­ed that indi­vid­u­als with COPD had over three times the odds of gen­er­al­ized anx­i­ety dis­or­der com­pared to those with­out. (COPD is an umbrel­la term for sev­er­al chron­ic lung dis­eases includ­ing emphy­se­ma and chron­ic bron­chi­tis.) Sleep prob­lems, chron­ic pain, and func­tion­al lim­i­ta­tions, par­tial­ly explained some of this excess risk for anx­i­ety among those with COPD com­pared to those with­out. “Even after account­ing for 18 pos­si­ble risk fac­tors for GAD, indi­vid­u­als with COPD still had 70% high­er odds of GAD com­pared to those with­out COPD,” said lead author, Pro­fes­sor Esme Fuller-Thom­son, San­dra Rot­man Endowed Chair at the Uni­ver­si­ty of Toron­to’s Fac­tor-Inwen­tash Fac­ul­ty of Social Work and Insti­tute for Life Course & Aging.

The study was based upon a rep­re­sen­ta­tive sam­ple of 11,163 Cana­di­ans aged 50 and over drawn from the 2012 Cana­di­an Com­mu­ni­ty Health Sur­vey. More than 700 of these old­er adults report­ed that they had been diag­nosed by a health pro­fes­sion­al with COPD. COPD is now the third lead­ing cause of death in the US.

The study also inves­ti­gat­ed pre­dic­tors of gen­er­al­ized anx­i­ety dis­or­ders specif­i­cal­ly among the old­er adults in the sam­ple who had COPD. Key risk fac­tors for GAD among those with COPD includ­ed lack of social sup­port and expo­sure to parental domes­tic vio­lence dur­ing the old­er adults’ child­hood. Old­er adults who do not have a con­fi­dant avail­able for impor­tant deci­sions had more than sev­en times the odds of hav­ing anx­i­ety in com­par­i­son to those with a con­fi­dant.

Co-author and doc­tor­al stu­dent Ash­ley Lacombe-Dun­can com­ment­ed, “Our find­ings sug­gest that screen­ing for anx­i­ety may be par­tic­u­lar­ly impor­tant for patients who lack a strong social net­work. Indi­vid­u­als with COPD may be prone to social iso­la­tion, par­tic­u­lar­ly if they also expe­ri­ence func­tion­al lim­i­ta­tions that impair mobil­i­ty.”

Old­er adults with COPD who were exposed in child­hood to parental domes­tic vio­lence on more than 10 occa­sions had five times the odds of gen­er­al­ized anx­i­ety dis­or­ders in com­par­i­son to those with COPD who had not expe­ri­enced this ear­ly adver­si­ty. Lacombe-Dun­can notes that “the chron­ic chaot­ic and vio­lent home envi­ron­ment may have pre­dis­posed indi­vid­u­als to anx­i­ety. Fur­ther research is need­ed to under­stand the path­ways through which wit­ness­ing chron­ic parental domes­tic vio­lence dur­ing the respondent’s child­hood may increase the preva­lence of anx­i­ety dis­or­ders among old­er adults with COPD.”

Dr. Fuller-Thom­son adds that this study “high­lights how health­care providers can play a sig­nif­i­cant role in iden­ti­fy­ing and pro­vid­ing promis­ing inter­ven­tions to reduce anx­i­ety for indi­vid­u­als with COPD, in par­tic­u­lar by screen­ing for and address­ing pain and func­tion­al lim­i­ta­tions and tar­get­ing those most at risk.”

Down­load a copy of the study: http://www.tandfonline.com/eprint/3yBcKVYUsiMtdth2Ynwy/full

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For more infor­ma­tion con­tact:

Prof. Esme Fuller-Thom­son
Pro­fes­sor & San­dra Rot­man Endowed Chair
Fac­tor-Inwen­tash Fac­ul­ty of Social Work &
Depart­ment of Fam­i­ly & Com­mu­ni­ty Med­i­cine
Uni­ver­si­ty of Toron­to
Cell: 416–209-3231
esme.fuller.thomson@utoronto.ca

Ash­ley Lacombe-Dun­can
Doc­tor­al Stu­dent
Fac­tor-Inwen­tash Fac­ul­ty of Social Work
Uni­ver­si­ty of Toron­to
Cell: 647–832-1004
ashley.lacombe.duncan@utoronto.ca