Article
Details
Citation
De Nys L, Oyebola EF, Connelly J, Ryde GC & Whittaker AC (2024) Digital music and movement intervention to improve health and wellbeing in older adults in care homes: a pilot mixed methods study. BMC Geriatrics, 24, p. 733. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12877-024-05324-3
Abstract
Background Low physical activity among older adults is related to adverse health outcomes such as depression and loneliness, poor physical function and increased risk of falls. This study was designed to increase physical activity through a digital, group-based, physical activity and music intervention and to examine its effectiveness on social, mental and physical health outcomes. Methods Participants were 34 older adults (65 years +) recruited across four care homes in Scotland to a pilot study. Surveys were administered at baseline and post-intervention, comprising measures of fear of falling, depression and anxiety, loneliness, sleep satisfaction and quality of life. A battery of physical function tests and saliva sampling for cortisol and dehydroepiandrosterone hormone analysis were also conducted at each time point. Additionally, process evaluation measures (recruitment, intervention fidelity, attendance, retention rates and safety) were monitored. The intervention comprised 12 weeks of three prescribed digital sessions per week: movement and music (n = 2) and music-only (n = 1), delivered by an activity coordinator in the care home. Post-intervention interviews with staff and participants were conducted to gain qualitative data on the acceptability of the intervention. Results An average of 88% of prescribed sessions were delivered. Pre-to post-intervention intention-to-treat analysis across all participants revealed significant improvements in anxiety, salivary DHEA, fear of falling and loneliness. There were no significant improvements in health-related quality of life, perceived stress, sleep satisfaction or physical function tests, including handgrip strength. Qualitative analysis highlighted benefits of and barriers to the programme. Conclusions The digital movement and music intervention was deemed acceptable and delivered with moderate fidelity, justifying progression to a full-scale trial. Although a proper control group would have yielded more confident causal relationships, preliminary psychosocial and biological effects were evident from this trial. To show significant improvements in physical function, it is likely that a bigger sample size providing sufficient power to detect significant changes, greater adherence, longer intervention and/or higher exercise volume may be necessary. Trial registration The trial is registered at ClinicalTrials.gov, number NCT05601102 on 01/11/2022.
Notes
De Nys et al. BMC Geriatrics (2024) 24:733 RESEARCH Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article' s Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article' s
Status | Published |
---|---|
Publication date | 04/09/2024 |
Publication date online | 04/09/2024 |
Date accepted by journal | 23/08/2024 |
People (4)
Senior Lecturer, Sport
PhD Researcher, Sport
PhD Researcher, Sport
Professor of Behavioural Medicine, Sport