The increase in health care costs associated with muscle weakness in older people without long-term illnesses in the Czech Republic: results from the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe (SHARE)
Abstract
Muscle weakness and associated diseases are likely to place a considerable economic burden on government healthcare expenditure. Our aim for this study therefore, was to estimate the direct and indirect costs connected with muscle weakness in the Czech Republic.
We applied a cost-of-illness approach, using data from the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe (SHARE). 689 participants aged 70 years and over and without any long-term illnesses were included in our study. A generalized linear model with the gamma distribution was carried out and odds ratio (OR) was calculated in order to explore the effect of muscle weakness on direct and indirect costs.
For both genders, muscle weakness had a statistically significant impact on direct costs (OR = 2.11), but did not have a statistically significant impact on indirect costs (OR = 1.08) or on total cost (OR = 1.51). Muscle weakness had the greatest statistically significant impact on direct costs in females (OR = 2.75).
In conclusion, our study has shown that muscle weakness may lead to increased direct costs and consequently place a burden on healthcare expenditure. Therefore, the results of this study could lead to greater interest in the prevention of muscle weakness amongst older people in the Czech Republic.