Background: The increasing population of elderly every year gives a contribution to a bigger number of health problems, such as cognitive impairment. Many instrument have been developed to examine cognitive function, but these instruments are often influenced by other factors, such as education and depression, thus affecting the results of the examination. Lately, the olfactory function assessment proves to be used for the examination of cognitive function, but it’s not yet known whether it’s affected by depression or education. The aim of this study was to determine the association of depression and sociodemographic factors (age, gender, and educational level) to the olfactory function of elderly.
Method: This study of 140 respondents was conducted in West Jakarta with cross sectional design. Assessment for olfactory function using 10 familiar odors in elderly (impaired if score < 7) and depression examination using Geriatric Depression Scale (GDS) (depressed if score = 5). Data analysis using Chi-Square test.
Results: Data showed that the average age was 67,46±4,93 years. The proportion of women was larger than men with a total of 88 subjects (62,9%), and most of them had low educational level (51,4%). About 18,6% of subjects experienced depression and about 30,8% suffered from olfactory dysfunction. There was significant association between age and olfactory dysfunction (p = 0,036; OR = 0,413), but there was no association between depression, gender, and education to olfactory function, and also none of the odors associated with depression (p > 0,05).
Conclusion: Age may affect the olfactory function, while depression, gender, and education have no correlation to olfactory function. |