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Published on: July 24, 2013
Measures of Frailty in Homebound Older Adults
Sara Shirai1, Min Ji Kwak1, Jessica Lee1
1From the Department of Internal Medicine, Division of Geriatric and Palliative Medicine, University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston, Houston.
Objectives:
Frailty, a geriatric syndrome associated with high morbidity and mortality, has rarely been assessed in homebound older adults. As such, we evaluated the prevalence of frailty among older adults enrolled in a home-based primary care program.
Methods:
We measured frailty using the Fried Frailty Phenotype criteria of unintentional weight loss, weakness, poor endurance, slowness, and low physical activity.
Results:
Of 25 homebound patients (average age 73), 14 (56%) were frail, 11 (44%) were prefrail, and none (0%) were robust. Among those who took ≥5 medications, 63% were frail and 37% were prefrail, and among those who had ≥10 comorbidities, 57% were frail and 43% were prefrail. We also observed that frailty in our homebound older adults was mainly driven by slow gait speed.
Conclusions:
Frailty is prevalent in homebound older adults and may be related to slower gait speed, polypharmacy, and/or multimorbidity.
