Trends in Instrumental Activities of Daily Living (IADLs)

Instrumental Activities of Daily Living (IADLs) comprise a range of complex activities needed to live independently. Limitations in one’s ability to accomplish these tasks are indicative of capability to live independently. Activities included in IADLS consist of: managing personal finances, taking medication, doing housework, planning and preparing meals, going shopping, using the phone, and taking transportation.

Please tell me if you have any difficulty with these activities because of a physical, mental, emotional or memory problem. […] Exclude any difficulties you expect to last less than three months: 1. Preparing a hot meal; 2. Shopping for groceries; 3. Making telephone calls; 4. Taking medications; 5. Doing work around the house or garden; 6. Managing money, such as paying bills and keeping track of expenses; 7. Leaving the house independently and accessing transportation services; 8. Doing personal laundry.

How to use the graph (click to view):

To view trends in the prevalence of IADL limitations for community-dwelling adults aged 65+ years, first select the level of disaggregation from the tabs below. To select the regions and trends to compare, either click the check-boxes below the graph or click on the groups in the legend to the right of the graph. Use your mouse and hover over the point of interest on the graph to view the figures for prevalence rates. Hovering over the graph will also activate the modebar in the top right corner of the graph, where the graphs can be downloaded, zoomed in/out, and more. The graphs are free to download using the camera icon in the top right corner of the graph, proper citation is required if used. See the notes below the graph for further details on the data used as well as how to cite the graph.

Income and wealth are categorized as those in the bottom two quintiles (i.e. up to the 40th percentile of the income/wealth distribution) versus the top three quintiles (i.e. all those above the 40th percentile). Income is measured as net household income aggregated from all income components in SHARE and wealth is measured as household net worth. For ranking in the income/wealth distribution, income and wealth are equivalized according to the OECD scale.

Note: Own calculations based on SHARE data release 7.0.0. Caution should be taken when interpreting changes in prevalence between points as the x-axis is not to scale. For our purposes, the prevalence of individuals aged 65+ years with IADL limitations consist of those with at least 1 IADL limitation. As wave 7 (2017) is a SHARELIFE module, no data are available on IADLs by income and wealth. Due to insufficient consistent data for all countries comprising the Eastern cluster for 2013, these data points are averaged between 2011 and 2015. Sample sizes of countries should be considered when interpreting trends for total women and men. Sample sizes are as follows: Total (n=130,970); Northern (n=26,968): Sweden (n=10,938), Netherlands (n=10,202), Denmark (n=5,828); Continental (n=56,477): Austria (n=2,593), Germany (n=28,626), France (n=19,536), Switzerland (n=2,361), Belgium (n=3,360); Southern (n=28,974): Spain (n=11,527), Italy (n=17,446); Eastern (n=18,551): Czech Republic (n=5,280), Poland (n=13,271). For further inquiries concerning the data, please contact us at futuregen@euro.centre.org.

To cite the graphs, please use the following citation, substituting the title of the graph and access date as appropriate:
FutureGen Data Navigator (2021). Prevalence of IADL limitations by gender (Aged 65+ years). Based on data from the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe. Accessed [insert date here] from https://futuregen.euro.centre.org/data-navigator/