Background: The World Health Organization (WHO) Technical Report 2003 stated that musculoskeletal disorders (MSDs) include osteoporosis, osteoarthritis, rheumatoid arthritis, spinal disorders, severe limb injury, trauma, or fracture. The burden of MSDs is global and looking at the gravity of the situation, WHO declared 20002010 as the bone and joint decade. As the geriatric people are more vulnerable to osteoporotic changes, there is a possibility that prevalence of MSDs will be more. So this cross-sectional study has been carried out among the geriatric people.
Objective: To assess the sociodemographic profiles of geriatric people, to find out the prevalence of MSDs among study participants, and to assess their health-seeking behavior toward MSD.
Materials and Methods: A total of 400 geriatric people were included in the study as study participants. Systematic sampling was followed to identify the household. The semi-structured questionnaire from the SJH Report was used to gather information regarding MSD problems.
Result: A total of 43% of the study participants belonged to lower middle class family, 48% participants had joint pain, and 21% had backache. Knee joint was the most commonly affected joint. Backache was more common in women (67%) than in men (33%) and was found to be statistically significant. A total of 31% of the participants had osteoarthritis, 2% had rheumatoid arthritis, 7% had soft tissue rheumatism, 1% had monoarticular joint pain and gout, 4.75% had severe limb injury, trauma, and fracture, 26% had pain at any site, and 13.3% had no complaint at all. Overall prevalence of MSD was 61%. A total of 45% were seeking treatment from local RMP, whereas 28% did not seek any treatment for MSD problem.
Conclusion: The geriatric people should undergo investigations such as serum calcium, vitamin D-3, and bone marrow density.
Key words: Musculoskeletal disorder (MSD), rural health and training center (RHTC), consumer price index (CPI)
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