Comparison of two different frailty scales in the longitudinal Swedish Adoption/Twin Study of Aging (SATSA)

2021 ◽  
pp. 140349482110599
Author(s):  
Alexandra M. Wennberg ◽  
Weiyao Yin ◽  
Fang Fang ◽  
Nancy L. Pedersen ◽  
Sara Hägg ◽  
...  

Aims: Although up to 25% of older adults are frail, assessing frailty can be difficult, especially in registry data. This study evaluated the utility of a code-based frailty score in registry data by comparing it to a gold-standard frailty score to understand how frailty can be quantified in population data and perhaps better addressed in healthcare. Methods: We compared the Hospital Frailty Risk Score (HFRS), a frailty measure based on 109 ICD codes, to a modified version of the Frailty Index (FI) Frailty Index (FI), a self-report frailty measure, and their associations with all-cause mortality both cross-sectionally and longitudinally (follow-up = 36 years) in a Swedish cohort study ( n = 1368). Results: The FI and HFRS were weakly correlated (rho = 0.11, p < 0.001). Twenty-two percent ( n = 297) of participants were considered frail based on published cut-offs of either measure. Only 3% ( n = 35) of participants were classified as frail by both measures; 4% ( n = 60) of participants were considered frail by only the HFRS; and 15% ( n = 202) of participants were considered frail based only on the FI. Frailty as measured by the HFRS showed greater variance and no clear increase or decrease with age, while frailty as measured by the FI increased steadily with age. In adjusted Cox proportional hazard models, baseline HFRS frailty (HR = 1.17, 95% CI 0.92, 1.49) was not statistically significantly associated with mortality, while FI frailty was (HR = 2.89, 95% CI 1.61, 2.23). These associations were modified by age and sex. Conclusions: The HFRS may not capture the full spectrum of frailty among community-dwelling individuals, particularly at younger ages, in Swedish registry data.

2016 ◽  
pp. 1-6
Author(s):  
O. THEOU ◽  
L. WIJEYARATNE ◽  
C. PIANTADOSI ◽  
K. LANGE ◽  
V. NAGANATHAN ◽  
...  

Objective: To examine whether a testosterone and a high calorie nutritional supplement intervention can reduce frailty scores in undernourished older people using multiple frailty tools. Design: Randomized controlled trial. Setting/Participants: 53 community-dwelling, undernourished men and women aged >65 years from South Australia, Victoria and New South Wales. Intervention: Intervention group received oral testosterone undecanoate and a high calorie supplement (2108-2416 kJ/day) whereas the control group received placebo testosterone and low calorie supplement (142-191 kJ/day). Measurements: Frailty was operationalized using three frailty indices (FI-lab, FI-self-report, FI-combined) and the frailty phenotype. Results: There were no significant differences in changes in frailty scores at either 6 or 12 months follow up between the two treatment groups for all scales. Participants at the intervention group were 4.8 times more likely to improve their FI-combined score at both time points compared to the placebo group. Conclusion: A testosterone and a high calorie nutritional supplement intervention did not improve the frailty levels of under-nourished older people. Even so, when frailty was measured using a frailty index combining self-reported and lab data we found that participants who received the intervention were more likely to show persistent improvement in their frailty scores.


2019 ◽  
pp. oemed-2018-105361 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christine G Parks ◽  
Armando Meyer ◽  
Laura E Beane Freeman ◽  
Jonathan Hofmann ◽  
Dale P Sandler

ObjectivesFarming has been associated with rheumatoid arthritis (RA). Some studies have evaluated the effects of pesticides, but other agricultural exposures may also affect immune response.MethodsWe investigated non-pesticide agricultural exposures in relation to RA in licensed pesticide applicators (n=27 175, mostly male farmers) and their spouses (n=22 231) in the Agricultural Health Study (AHS) cohort (1993–1997) who completed at least one follow-up survey through 2015. Incident RA cases (n=229 applicators and 249 spouses) were identified based on self-report confirmed by use of disease-modifying antirheumatic drugs or medical records. Hazard Ratios (HRs) and 95% Confidence Intervals (CIs) were estimated by Cox proportional hazard models adjusting for applicator status, state, smoking, education and specific pesticide use, allowing estimates to vary by median age when hazards assumptions were not met.ResultsOverall, RA was associated with regularly applying chemical fertilisers (HR=1.50; 95% CI 1.11 to 2.02), using non-gasoline solvents (HR=1.40; 95% CI 1.09 to 1.80), and painting (HR=1.26; 95% CI 1.00 to 1.59). In older applicators (>62 years), RA was associated with driving combines (HR=2.46; 95% CI 1.05 to 5.78) and milking cows (HR=2.56; 95% CI 1.01 to 6.53). In younger participants (≤62 years), RA was inversely associated with raising animals as well as crops (HR=0.68; 95% CI 0.51 to 0.89 vs crops only). Associations with specific crops varied by age: some (eg, hay) were inversely associated with RA in younger participants, while others (eg, alfalfa) were associated with RA in older participants.ConclusionThese findings suggest several agricultural tasks and exposures may contribute to development of RA.


2019 ◽  
Vol 3 (Supplement_1) ◽  
pp. S682-S682
Author(s):  
Joanna M Blodgett ◽  
Kenneth Rockwood ◽  
Olga Theou

Abstract Positive advances in life expectancy, healthcare access and medical technology have been accompanied by an increased prevalence of chronic diseases and substantial population ageing. How this impacts changes in both frailty level and subsequent mortality in recent decades are not well understood. We aimed to investigate how these factors changed over an 18-year period. Nine waves of the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (1999-2016) were harmonized to create a 46-item frailty index (FI) using self-reported and laboratory-based health deficits. Individuals aged 20+ were included in analyses (n=44086). Mortality was ascertained in December 2015. Weighted multilevel models estimated the effect of cohort on FI score in 10-year age-stratified groups. Cox proportional hazard models estimated if two or four-year mortality risk of frailty changed across the 1999-2012 cohorts. Mean FI score was 0.11±0.10. In the five older age groups (&gt;40 years), later cohorts had higher frailty levels than did earlier cohorts. For example, in people aged 80+, each subsequent cohort had an estimated 0.007 (95%CI: 0.005, 0.009) higher FI score. However, in those aged 20-29, later cohorts had lower frailty [β=-0.0009 (-0.0013, -0.0005)]. Hazard ratios and cohort-frailty interactions indicated that there was no change in two or four-year lethality of FI score over time (i.e. two-year mortality: HR of 1.069 (1.055, 1.084) in 1999-2000 vs 1.061 (1.044, 1.077) in 2011-2012). Higher frailty levels in the most recent years in middle and older aged adults combined with unchanged frailty lethality suggests that the degree of frailty may continue to increase.


2018 ◽  
Vol 72 (9) ◽  
pp. 845-851 ◽  
Author(s):  
Raquel Garcia ◽  
Rosa Abellana ◽  
Jordi Real ◽  
José-Luis del Val ◽  
Jose Maria Verdú-Rotellar ◽  
...  

BackgroundInformation regarding the effect of social determinants of health on heart failure (HF) community-dwelling patients is scarce. We aimed to analyse the presence of socioeconomic inequalities, and their impact on hospitalisations and mortality, in patients with HF attended in a universal healthcare coverage system.MethodsA retrospective cohort study carried out in patients with HF aged >40 and attended at the 53 primary healthcare centres of the Institut Català de la Salut in Barcelona (Spain). Socioeconomic status (SES) was determined by an aggregated deprivation index (MEDEA). Cox proportional hazard models and competing-risks regression based on Fine and Gray’s proportional subhazards were performed to analyse hospitalisations due to of HF and total mortality that occurred between 1 January 2009 and 31 December 2012.ResultsMean age was 78.1 years (SD 10.2) and 56% were women. Among the 8235 patients included, 19.4% died during the 4 years of follow-up and 27.1% were hospitalised due to HF. A gradient in the risk of hospitalisation was observed according to SES with the highest risk in the lowest socioeconomic group (sHR 1.46, 95% CI 1.27 to 1.68). Nevertheless, overall mortality did not differ among the socioeconomic groups.ConclusionsIn spite of finding a gradient that linked socioeconomic deprivation to an increased risk of hospitalisation, there were no differences in mortality regarding SES in a universal healthcare coverage system.


Author(s):  
W.-H. Lu ◽  
K.V. Giudici ◽  
Y. Rolland ◽  
S. Guyonnet ◽  
Y. Li ◽  
...  

Background: Brain amyloid-beta (Aβ) plaques, a hallmark of the pathophysiology of Alzheimer’s disease, have been associated with frailty. Whether the plasma Aβ markers show similar relationship with frailty is unknown. OBJECTIVES: To investigate the prospective associations between plasma Aβ42/40 ratio and overtime frailty in community-dwelling older adults. METHODS: From the 5-year Multidomain Alzheimer Preventive Trial (MAPT), we included 477 adults ≥70 years with available data on plasma Aβ42/40 ratio (lower is worse). Fried frailty phenotype (robust, pre-frail and frail) was assessed at the same time-point of plasma Aβ measures and after until the end of follow-up. The outcomes of interest were the change in the frailty phenotype over time (examined by mixed-effect ordinal logistic regressions) and incident frailty (examined by Cox proportional hazard models). RESULTS: Plasma Aβ42/40 did not show significant associations with incident frailty; however, after adjusting for Apolipoprotein E (APOE) ε4 genotype, people in the lower quartile of plasma Aβ42/40 (≤0.103) had higher risk of incident frailty (HR=2.63; 95% CI, 1.00 to 6.89), compared to those in the upper quartile (>0.123). Exploratory analysis found a significant association between the lower quartile of plasma Aβ42/40 and incident frailty among APOE ε4 non-carriers (HR=3.48; 95% CI, 1.19 to 10.16), but not among carriers. No associations between plasma Aβ42/40 and evolution of frailty were observed. CONCLUSION: No significant associations between plasma Aβ42/40 and frailty were found when APOE ε4 status was not accounted into the model. Nevertheless, APOE ε4 non-carriers with high Aβ burden might be more susceptible to develop frailty.


2021 ◽  
pp. 1-6
Author(s):  
Marie-Laure Ancelin ◽  
Joanna Norton ◽  
Jacqueline Scali ◽  
Karen Ritchie ◽  
Isabelle Chaudieu ◽  
...  

Diurnal salivary cortisol was measured in 334 older adults without dementia, at four times on two separate days, under quiet and stressful conditions. In multivariate Cox proportional hazard models, higher global diurnal cortisol secretion was associated with incident dementia (HR = 1.09 [1.02–1.15] per one-unit increase in cortisol measure, p = 0.007) and Alzheimer’s disease (HR = 1.12 [1.04–1.21], p = 0.003) over a mean(SD) of 8.1(4.0) years, independent of potential confounders and stressful conditions. Individuals with incident dementia had a slower rate of cortisol elimination under non-stressful conditions, reflected by higher cortisol levels in the evening, and an abnormal response to stress (blunted evening stress response).


2021 ◽  
Vol 5 (Supplement_1) ◽  
pp. 822-823
Author(s):  
Alexandra Wennberg ◽  
Karin Modig

Abstract Frailty is associated with poor health outcomes, reduced quality of life, and mortality. To understand how prevalence of frailty may have changed across birth cohorts, we investigated frailty prevalence at ages 75, 85, and 95 in people born in 1910, 1920, and 1930 in Swedish national registry data. Frailty was assessed with the Hospital Frailty Risk Score, a weighted sum of 109 ICD codes, which we calculated for each year leading up to the specified ages. We additionally investigated the association between frailty and mortality in these birth cohorts. We observed, at 75, a decrease in prevalence of frailty across birth cohorts (16.9%, 10.8%, and 8.8%, respectively). Interestingly, at 85, we found a U-shaped pattern, where those born in 1920 (14.1%) had lower prevalence of frailty than those born in either 1910 (27.7%) or 1930 (25.1%). At age 95, we saw a low prevalence of frailty in the 1910 (7.3%) and 1920 (3.8%) birth cohorts –potentially because of selective survival. There were not substantial differences in prevalence of frailty by sex or birth country. In Cox proportional hazard models adjusted for sex, frailty was consistently associated with mortality. We observed the greatest hazard ratios in the 1930 birth cohort at 75 (HR=2.79, 95% CI 2.62, 2.97) and 85 (HR=2.26, 95% CI 2.01, 2.53) and the 1920 birth cohort at 75 (HR=2.19, 95% CI 2.09, 2.29), where risk was double that of those who were not frail. Understanding changes in prevalence of frailty will help inform public health and intervention measures.


Circulation ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 142 (Suppl_3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Marlena Fernandez ◽  
Marie Pitteloud ◽  
Angelica Torres ◽  
Sergio Ruiz ◽  
Victor Cevallos ◽  
...  

Background: Atrial fibrillation (AF), the commonest arrhythmia among older adults, is associated with increased mortality. Frailty constitutes a state of vulnerability to stressors resulting from multisystemic loss of physiological reserve. The study aim was to determine whether concurrent frailty and AF increases all-cause mortality in older Veterans. Methods: Retrospective cohort study of community-dwelling Veterans 60 years and older identified as having baseline AF (ICD codes) or frailty through a 30-item VA Frailty Index (VA-FI). The VA-FI was generated as a proportion of morbidity, function, sensory loss, cognition/mood and other variables. The VA-FI categorized Veterans into non-frail (robust FI≤.10, prefrail FI=>.10,<.21) and frail (FI≥.21). The combination resulted in 4 groups: Neither AF nor frailty (NoAF-F), atrial fibrillation (AF), frailty (F), and AF and frailty (AF-F). At the end of follow-up, data on mortality was aggregated and adjusted for age, gender, race, ethnicity, marital status, and BMI, the association of concurrent AF and/or frailty with all-cause mortality was determined using a Cox regression model including testing for interaction effects. Results: A total of 16391 Veterans were included, mean age 72.06 (SD=9.23) years 74.2% White, 86.7% non-Hispanic, and 97.9% male. There were 1534 (9.4%) Veterans with AF and the proportion of robust, pre-frail and frail patients was 44.3% (n=7255), 37.2% (n=6095) and 18.6% (n=3041) respectively. The 4 resulting groups were NoAF-F (12357, 75.4%), AF (993, 6.1%), F (2500, 15.3%) and AF-F (541, 3.3%). Over a median follow-up of 2025 days (IQR=245) 3917 deaths occurred. As compared with NoAF-F, AF-F, F and AF in that order had higher all-cause mortality, adjusted hazard ratio (HR)=3.24 (95%CI:2.88-3.66), p<.0005; HR=2.06 (95%CI:1.90-2.22), p<.0005; and HR=1.47 (95%CI:1.31-1.64), p<.0005 respectively. When frailty and AF were considered jointly they did not interact. Conclusions: The combination of AF and frailty at baseline represents the group with highest risk for all-cause mortality in older Veterans. Further studies may be needed to assess the impact on mortality of clinical interventions targeting both conditions.


2020 ◽  
Vol 5 (4) ◽  
pp. 959-970
Author(s):  
Kelly M. Reavis ◽  
James A. Henry ◽  
Lynn M. Marshall ◽  
Kathleen F. Carlson

Purpose The aim of this study was to examine the relationship between tinnitus and self-reported mental health distress, namely, depression symptoms and perceived anxiety, in adults who participated in the National Health and Nutrition Examinations Survey between 2009 and 2012. A secondary aim was to determine if a history of serving in the military modified the associations between tinnitus and mental health distress. Method This was a cross-sectional study design of a national data set that included 5,550 U.S. community-dwelling adults ages 20 years and older, 12.7% of whom were military Veterans. Bivariable and multivariable logistic regression was used to estimate the association between tinnitus and mental health distress. All measures were based on self-report. Tinnitus and perceived anxiety were each assessed using a single question. Depression symptoms were assessed using the Patient Health Questionnaire, a validated questionnaire. Multivariable regression models were adjusted for key demographic and health factors, including self-reported hearing ability. Results Prevalence of tinnitus was 15%. Compared to adults without tinnitus, adults with tinnitus had a 1.8-fold increase in depression symptoms and a 1.5-fold increase in perceived anxiety after adjusting for potential confounders. Military Veteran status did not modify these observed associations. Conclusions Findings revealed an association between tinnitus and both depression symptoms and perceived anxiety, independent of potential confounders, among both Veterans and non-Veterans. These results suggest, on a population level, that individuals with tinnitus have a greater burden of perceived mental health distress and may benefit from interdisciplinary health care, self-help, and community-based interventions. Supplemental Material https://doi.org/10.23641/asha.12568475


2019 ◽  
Vol 99 (1) ◽  
pp. 51-59 ◽  
Author(s):  
J. Qi ◽  
Z. Zihang ◽  
J. Zhang ◽  
Y.M. Park ◽  
D. Shrestha ◽  
...  

Periodontitis is positively linked to cardiovascular disease (CVD), diabetes, cancer, and increased mortality. Empirically derived clusters of IgG antibodies against 19 selected periodontal microorganisms have been associated with hyperglycemia. We further investigated associations between these serum IgG antibody clusters and all-cause and CVD mortality in a representative US population. Participants free of CVD and cancer and aged ≥40 y at baseline ( N = 6,491) from the Third National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (1988 to 1994) were followed up until December 31, 2011. Antibodies were categorized into 4 clusters: red-green, orange-red, yellow-orange, and orange-blue. Over a 23-y follow-up, 2,702 deaths occurred, including 810 CVD-related deaths. In fully adjusted Cox proportional hazard models, the red-green cluster was positively associated with all-cause mortality (tertile 3 vs. tertile 1: hazard ratio [HR] = 1.43, 95% CI = 1.08 to 1.90, P = 0.015). The yellow-orange cluster was inversely associated with all-cause mortality (tertile 3 vs. tertile 1: HR = 0.78, 95% CI = 0.63 to 0.97, P = 0.028) and CVD mortality (tertile 2 vs. tertile 1: HR = 0.57, 95% CI = 0.42 to 0.77, P = 0.005). The orange-blue cluster (composed of antibodies against Eubacterium nodatum and Actinomyces naeslundii) was inversely associated with all-cause mortality (tertile 3 vs. tertile 1: HR = 0.65, 95% CI = 0.55 to 0.78, P < 0.0001) and CVD mortality (tertile 3 vs. tertile 1: HR = 0.65, 95% CI = 0.47 to 0.88, P = 0.007). These antibodies could predict prognosis or be potential intervention targets to prevent systemic effects of periodontal disease if further studies establish a causal relationship.


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