Are Fear of COVID-19, Anxiety of Death, and Fear of Death Different Among Medical Ilnesses in the Elderly?

Objective: In this study, we aimed to investigate the relationship between older patients with various illnesses' anxiety and Coronavirus disease-2019 (COVID-19) fear of death.Materials and Methods: An elderly population made up the study participants who applied to the Gaziantep University Faculty of Medicine, Department of Geriatrics Outpatient in order between 01.02.2022 and 01.05.2022, had at least one disease, and were under treatment. The socio-demographic data form and the COVID-19 fear scale, the death anxiety scale, and the fear of death scale were administered to all patients. SPSS for Windows 22 (Statistical Package for Social Sciences for Windows 22) was used in the calculations.Results: Two hundred and fifty patients who met the inclusion requirements received examination with a variety of tools. Two hundred and thirty four patients who completely filled out the forms were used in the analysis. The mean age of the patients was 70.51 +/- 6.11 years, 114 (48.7%) were male, and 120 were female (51.3%). COVID-19 fear scale and fear of death scale were statistically significantly higher in women (p=0.037, p=0.010, respectively). Cardiovascular, respiratory, gastrointestinal, neurological, musculoskeletal, genito-urinary, and multisystem-related diseases were diagnosed in the participants. The groups' differences on the death anxiety scale were statistically significant (F: 2.805, p=0.012) as a consequence of the comparison of the groups.Conclusion: This was the first study to group the diseases in the elderly according to the systems and compared with the fear of COVID-19, anxiety of death, and fear of death. To generalize the results, prospective controlled research with bigger samples is required.