ارزیابی مصرف انرژی معادل متابولیک بر اساس الگوی فعالیت جسمانی هفتگی سالمندان

Introduction and purpose: Physical activity is an important component of health at old age and energy expenditure vary according to level of physical activity. The current study aimed to assess physical activity-related energy expenditure and metabolic equivalent of elderly in Kashan, Iran. Materials & Methods: This descriptive cross-sectional study was conducted among 400 elderly (aged more than 60 years old) attending to health care centers of Kashan. The sampling method in this study was multiple-stage cluster sampling. International Physical Activity Questionnaire was used to calculate physical activity and the metabolic equivalent. Data analyzed using SPSS version 16 by employing variety of tests including descriptive statistics, Kolmogorov-Smirnov test, Kruskal-Wallis test and regression. The significance level for all the tests were considered p<0.05. Findings: The results of this study indicated that average metabolic expenditure of elderly was 364.84 &plusmn;326.21 (IQR=222). Majority of elderly (%79.2) placed in low energy expenditure category and mainly (%87.2) had low levels of physical activity. Our findings showed a significant relationship between the average energy expenditure with physical activity level (p=0.001). According to the results of regression analysis, walking (p=0.001), personal affairs (p=0.001), housekeeping Affairs (p=0.001), activities related to leisure time (p=0.001) and sedentary activities (p=0.001) were significant predictors of energy expenditure among elderly. Conclusion: The results of current study showed that elderly had low level of energy expenditure and physical activity. Thereby, it is recommended to provide opportunities for physical activity at health-care centers and educate staffs for motivating elderly to have an active life.