Suffering from Loneliness Indicates Significant Mortality Risk of Older People

Table 1

Baseline characteristics and 57-month mortality by suffering from loneliness.

Characteristic	Not lonely 𝑁=2260	Lonely 𝑁=1427	𝑃-value^1
Women, %	63.1	76.6	<.001
Age, years (range)	80.8 (70–99)	81.7 (72–98)	<.001
Widowed, %	40,5	64,5	<.001
Living in residential care, %	5.6	10.4	<.001
High education, %	39.2	30.0	<.001
Poor health, %	26.4	46,3	<.001
Poor income, %	1.5	4.8	<.001
Poor functioning, %	13.9	29.7	<.001
Goes outdoors daily, %	85.0	72.9	<.001
Subjective need for daily help, %	19.6	36.7	<.001
Poor vision, %	5.1	10.4	<.001
Poor hearing, %	9.8	16.3	<.001
Physical exercise hobby weekly, %	67,6	55,0	<.001
Deceased within 57 months	23,4	30.8	<.001
Hazard ratios of loneliness (95% confidence intervals)
Unadjusted	1.00	1.38 (1.21–1.57)	<.001
Age and gender	1.00	1.33 (1.17–1.51)	<.001
Age, gender, and subjective health	1.00	1.17 (1.02–1.33)	.022

¹Differences between the groups were tested with 𝑋² test for categorical variables, and with Mann-Whitney 𝑈 test for continuous variables.