Rui Zhang,1,2 Zhengyao Yang,3 Xiaoyong Shen,3 Lu Xia,4 Yun Cheng5 

1Department of Nursing, Huadong Hospital Affiliated to Fudan University, Shanghai, 200040, People’s Republic of China; 2School of Nursing, Fudan University, Shanghai, 200030, People’s Republic of China; 3Department of Chest Surgery, Huadong Hospital Affiliated to Fudan University, Shanghai, 200040, People’s Republic of China; 4Day Surgery Unit, Huadong Hospital Affiliated to Fudan University, Shanghai, 200040, People’s Republic of China; 5School of Medicine, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shenzhen, 518172, People’s Republic of China

Correspondence: Lu Xia, Day Surgery Unit, Huadong Hospital Affiliated to Fudan University, No. 221 of Yanan West Road, Jingan District, Shanghai, 200040, People’s Republic of China, Tel +86 21-62483180-530401, Email yihaibeilu@126.com Yun Cheng, School of Medicine, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shenzhen, 518172, People’s Republic of China, Tel +86 755-23519000, Email cloud2011930@qq.com

Objective: To identify latent classes of preoperative physical dysfunction in elderly patients with early lung cancer. To analyze the differences in demographic characteristics between different classes.
Methods: We invited elderly patients with early lung cancer who were scheduled for surgery at Shanghai Elderly Characteristic Hospital to participate in the study using a convenience sampling method. We took latent class analysis to divide elderly patients with early lung cancer into latent classes based on preoperative physical dysfunction features. Furthermore, we used single-factor analysis and multinomial logistic regression to investigate the influence variables of each latent class.
Results: The characteristics of preoperative physical dysfunction in elderly patients with early lung cancer can be divided into “Anxiety/depression emotion-poor sleep group” “Frailty of physical function group” “Pulmonary hypofunction-low activity tolerance group”. The distribution of age, chronic disease history, COPD history, smoking history and perceived social support level of elderly patients with early lung cancer in different potential categories were not the same, and the differences were statistically significant (P< 0.05). The elderly lung cancer patients with chronic disease history and age ≥ 75 years were more likely to be classified as “frailty of physical function group”. The elderly lung cancer patients with COPD and smoking history were more likely to be classified into “pulmonary hypofunction-low activity tolerance group”. Elderly lung cancer patients with moderate or low degree of perceived social support were more prone to be grouped into “anxiety/depression emotion-poor sleep group”.
Conclusion: The variety of preoperative physical dysfunction seen in elderly patients with early lung cancer can be categorized into three latent classes. Medical professionals should create strategies for intervention for multiple patient populations with the goal of further enhancing their general state of life.

Keywords: elderly, lung neoplasm, preoperative physical dysfunction, latent class analysis, influence factors