Clinical implications of frailty in peritoneal dialysis patients - A prospective observational study

Frailty is an age-related condition that predicts adverse outcomes. The study was aimed to investigate the clinical implications of frailty evolution in patients undergoing peritoneal dialysis (PD).

In this prospective study, all new-onset (<6 months) and prevalent (≧6 months) PD patients completed frailty assessment at entry and 6 months by a semiautomated frailty index of 80 risk factors (FI₈₀) which also contained the 5 components of Fried frailty phenotype. A score ≧13/80 (FI₈₀ > 0.16) or ≧3/5 (frailty phenotype) was designated to define frailty.

337 PD patients were recruited (new-onset 23.4%, prevalent 76.6%). Two hundred (59.3%) and 163 (48.4%) patients were frail by FI₈₀ and frailty phenotype, respectively. Predictors for frailty were old age, dialysis, diabetes mellitus, gout and sleep disorder. New-onset patients aged <55 years displayed the best evolution of frailty over 6 months (stable or improved, n = 29/47, 61.7% by FI₈₀, p = 0.0293), compared with other groups. Survival analysis found that frail patients exhibited the worse outcomes (overall death and hospitalization). Poisson regression showed frailty was associated with increased utilizations of outpatient and ER services; however multivariate Cox models identified only diabetes, gout and low body mass index (<19 kg/m²), but not frailty, predicted overall death and hospitalizations.

Frailty is a common medical condition in PD patients, and the status of which can be stabilized or improved in new-onset, young patients at least over the short term. Compared with frailty, certain comorbidities (diabetes and gout) and undernutrition appeared to be more robust in the prediction of adverse outcomes.