"We pull on forms that are really ancient but have some functional history," Signorile explains.
From an applied science perspective, we propose that adaptations are registered as functional history in tissues and joints.
This patient group may have been easier to interview for functional history and more likely to have positive clinical outcomes.
We postulate that data in the medical records reflected the functional history obtained more frequently from proxies than patients themselves, which is likely for an acutely ill elderly population.
Second, although the Sullivan method is a popular method of calculating DFLE, it has several drawbacks, such as the fact that its assumptions constrain the portrayal of the expected life cycle or the functional status histories of persons who are exposed to current mortality and morbidity conditions.
Inpatients also presented with a significantly higher rate of preoperative comorbidities, including dyspnea, steroid use, total functional dependency, history of bleeding disorder, dialysis use, history of COPD, history of CHF, and disseminated cancer (p < 0.001).
Interventions: Functional questionnaires, history, physical exam (including Schober test), and plain film radiographs.
Awareness of factors such as age, functional dependence, history of pain at rest, and prior sepsis could facilitate additional monitoring of these patients in conjunction with internists, and is important for truly informed consent.
Disease features significantly associated with reduced survival are an increased severity of cognitive impairment, decreased functional level, history of falls, and disturbances in the neurological examination.
Both our study and that by Reznick et al. (2004) suggest that extrinsic mortality influences the evolution of functional life-history traits.
