Somatic Complaints among Elderly Migrants in Germany

Bodily complaints are widespread among the elderly; few surveys investigating bodily complaints among elder migrants exist in Germany and internationally. Our multi-centric cross section study examined bodily complaints among persons between 60 and 84 years dwelling in Stuttgart on the basis of the short version of the Giessen Complaint Questionnaire (GBB-24). In Germany 648 were explored with 13.4% (n = 87) born outside of Germany. Gender distribution was equal among migrants and non-migrants; socioeconomic status was lower among the migrants: 8.0% (n = 7) of the migrants and 2.5% (n = 14) of the non-migrants had at most four years of education; 12.6% (n = 11) of the migrants and 8.2% (n = 46) of the non-migrants held a net income of below 1000 (sic); 26.4% of the migrants and 38.1% (n = 214) of the non-migrants disposed over 2000 (sic) monthly. The incidence of somatic complaints was 65.5% (n = 57) among the migrants and 55.8% (n = 313) among the non-migrants. Women (61.8%) displayed more often somatic complaints than men (51.8%). Somatic complaints increased with age. Except of the group aged between 70-74 years no significant difference between migrants and non-migrants could be shown concerning the incidence of bodily complaints. Outlook: population based studies on bodily complaints among migrants are urgently needed.