[Validation of the questionnaire for screening frailty]

Area of Science:

• Gerontology
• Public Health
• Clinical Medicine

Background:

• Frailty is a significant geriatric syndrome impacting older adults' health.
• Screening for frailty in daily practice is crucial for timely intervention.
• Existing frailty assessment models can be time-consuming in clinical settings.

Purpose of the Study:

• To develop and validate a questionnaire for screening frailty in outpatients.
• To assess the questionnaire's agreement with established frailty models.
• To determine optimal cut-off points for frailty screening using the questionnaire.

Main Methods:

• Development of a questionnaire covering weight loss, sensory impairment, falls, mood, cognition, incontinence, and mobility.
• Inclusion of 356 outpatients in Moscow (mean age 74.9 years).
• Comparison of questionnaire results with Fried phenotype and Rockwood frailty index criteria via ROC analysis and Spearman correlation.

Main Results:

• The questionnaire showed satisfactory agreement with both the phenotype model (AUC=0.765) and frailty index model (AUC=0.731).
• Significant correlations were found between questionnaire scores and both frailty models (Spearman r=0.4 and 0.41, p<0.001).
• A cut-off score of ≥3 points demonstrated high sensitivity (85.7% and 93.3%) for frailty detection.

Conclusions:

• The developed questionnaire is a valid and reliable tool for screening frailty in outpatient settings.
• A cut-off score of ≥3 points is recommended for optimal sensitivity in frailty screening.
• The high prevalence of positive screens (58.4%) highlights the need for frailty assessment in this population.