A study of the mediating effect of decreased intrinsic capacity between symptoms and activities of daily living in elderly patients with heart failure

Objective

To investigate the mediating effect of decreased Intrinsic capacity(IC) between symptoms and ability to perform activities of daily living(ADL) in elderly patients with Heart failure(HF).

Methods

Using a convenience sampling method, 237 elderly patients with HF in the cardiology department of a Grade A Tertiary Hospital in Suzhou, China were selected from January 2022 to November 2022, and the General Information Questionnaire, Symptom Status Questionnaire-Heart Failure (SSQ-HF), Barthel Index Scale (BI), and IC Assessment Tool were applied to investigate the mediating effect of IC between HF symptoms and ADL using structural equation modeling.

Results

HF symptoms and decreased IC were associated with patients' ability to perform ADL (P=0.005, P<0.001), and decreased IC partially mediated the effect between HF symptoms and ADL, indirectly negatively predicting ADL with a mediating effect of -0.412, accounting for 59.11% of the total effect.

Conclusion

Decreased IC in elderly patients with HF is a mediating variable between HF symptoms and ADL. Healthcare professionals can use the multidimensional assessment framework of IC to identify early the risk of impaired ADL in elderly HF patients and to provide targeted rehabilitation interventions for this group of patients.