Cherish your muscles for good recovery
Of the over-70s who suddenly end up in hospital, 40 percent do not recover well. After three months they are unable to do the usual things in the house, such as washing, cooking or showering. This is the conclusion of PhD research by lecturer researcher Jesse van Aarden. The solution: use your muscles.
It has been known for some time, but a recent PhD research shows it again: if you are older than 70, a sudden hospitalization can be an attack on your health. There is a 40 percent chance that you have not yet recovered three months after being discharged. In concrete terms, this means that you cannot do the normal things at home, such as dressing, showering and cooking. This is apparent from research among 400 people over the age of seventy in six different hospitals. Lecturer-researcher Jesse Aarden of the Amsterdam University of Applied Sciences and Amsterdam UMC obtained her doctorate on 1 June 2022 for her research into this.
Survival Mode
Every year, 300,000 elderly people (over 70s) are acutely hospitalized. Especially if you already suffered from ailing health before the admission, you run the risk that the recovery after the admission will not go smoothly. In this study it became clear which factors are important after discharge from hospital. Is your muscle strength bad, are you unable to eat well or do you feel depressed or anxious? Then you run a higher risk of poorer recovery. ‘During an acute hospitalization, the elderly often enter a kind of survival mode,’ says researcher Aarden on the website of the Hogeschool. ‘Their energy goes primarily to the vital organs, not to the muscles. This is necessary, but causes them to deteriorate physically. Good support during and after an admission is therefore crucial.’
muscle strength
What can you do yourself to recover properly? The most important thing is to work your muscles and eat right. Be as active as you can and keep moving while you are in hospital. If you have become anxious about falling again, or if you feel gloomy, be sure to seek help, Aarden advises. Because if you move less because of this, you only get further from home. Aarden now goes deeper into the matter: he wants to be able to see even better in the data in files who will recover badly, so that help can be offered earlier.
Professor Andrea Maier, currently working in Australia, has been insisting for some time: muscle strength is the best way to stay, or become, vital. Read her tips here: https://www.plusonline.nl/matten-en-bedrijven/houd-je-iaanse-op-dicht
