Walking into aging: real-world mobility patterns and digital benchmarks from the InCHIANTI Study

Albites-Sanabria J, Palumbo P, Bandinelli S, D’Ascanio I, Mellone S, Paraschiv-Ionescu A, Küderle A, Cereatti A, Del Din S, Kluge F, Gazit E, Jansen CP, Delgado-Ortiz L, Garcia-Aymerich J, Rochester L, Klenk J, Ferrucci L, Becker C, Chiari L, Palmerini L (2025)

Publication Type: Journal article

Publication year: 2025

Journal

npj Aging Nature Publishing Group

Book Volume: 11

Article Number: 60

Journal Issue: 1

DOI: 10.1038/s41514-025-00245-w

Abstract

Mobility is a cornerstone of health and quality of life, particularly in older adults. Digital mobility outcomes (DMOs) from real-world walking data offer crucial insights into the functional status and early markers of mobility decline. This study provides reference values for walking activity, pace, rhythm, and gait bout-to-bout variability in community-dwelling older adults and evaluates the effects of age, sex, height, and weight on these parameters. Using data from 200 older adults (aged 65–94 years) from the InCHIANTI Study and applying the Mobilise-D computational pipeline, we analyzed real-world walking over a week. Significant differences by sex and age were found, with males showing higher walking activity in younger age groups (65–74 and 75–84 years) but not in the oldest group (85–94 years). Additionally, we observed non-linear trends in mobility metrics with age, indicating an accelerated reduction in mobility at certain age ranges. These findings underscore the importance of monitoring real-world walking data to pinpoint critical periods of mobility decline and guide targeted interventions. This work offers valuable benchmarks for clinical assessments and future research.

Authors with CRIS profile

Arne Küderle Machine Learning and Data Analytics Lab

Involved external institutions

University of Bologna / Università di Bologna IT Italy (IT) Azienda Sanitaria di Firenze IT Italy (IT) École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL) CH Switzerland (CH) Politecnico di Torino IT Italy (IT) Newcastle upon Tyne Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust GB United Kingdom (GB) Novartis AG CH Switzerland (CH) Tel Aviv Sourasky Medical Center / Ichilov Hospital IL Israel (IL) Robert-Bosch-Krankenhaus DE Germany (DE) Instituto de Salud Global de Barcelona (ISGlobal) ES Spain (ES) National Institute on Aging (NIA) US United States (USA) (US)

How to cite

APA:

Albites-Sanabria, J., Palumbo, P., Bandinelli, S., D’Ascanio, I., Mellone, S., Paraschiv-Ionescu, A.,... Palmerini, L. (2025). Walking into aging: real-world mobility patterns and digital benchmarks from the InCHIANTI Study. npj Aging, 11(1). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41514-025-00245-w

MLA:

Albites-Sanabria, Jose, et al. "Walking into aging: real-world mobility patterns and digital benchmarks from the InCHIANTI Study." npj Aging 11.1 (2025).

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