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Updated: May 5, 2026
Measuring Frailty in HIV-infected Individuals. Identification of Frail Patients is the First Step to Amelioration and Reversal of Frailty
Published on: July 24, 2013
Blood levels of immune-related biomarkers and future risk for prefrailty/frailty: The prospective ATTICA sub-study
Sofia-Panagiota Giannakopoulou1, Danai Sgouropoulou2, Fotios Barkas3
1Department of Nutrition and Dietetics, School of Health Sciences and Education, Harokopio University, Athens, Greece.
Background:
Given that low-grade inflammation is implicated in the pathophysiology of age-related frailty, we tested the hypothesis that individual blood biomarkers are associated with the risk of developing frailty in later life.
Methods:
Participants of the ATTICA cohort aged ≥ 33 years in 2002 were assessed for age-related frailty in 2024. By multivariable logistic regression models, we tested the association of an array of baseline immune-related biomarkers, as well as of an aggregate score, namely ImmActScore, that combines IL-6, TNF-α and fibrinogen, on the odds of later-life frailty.
Results:
Among 574 participants (mean baseline age 48 ± 8; 50% male), phenotypic FRAIL scale assessment categorized 6% as frail, 29% as prefrail, and 65% as robust. After adjustments for various socio-demographic and clinical characteristics, baseline fibrinogen (OR=1.004, 95%CI:1.000-1.007, p = 0.037) and ImmActScore (OR=1.239, 95%CI:1.007-1.525, p = 0.042) showed significant associations, suggesting that higher baseline levels are associated with increased odds for prefrailty/frailty in the very long-term.
Conclusions:
Fibrinogen and a composite score capturing immune activation status by combining IL-6, TNF-α and fibrinogen, were both associated with the odds of prefrailty/frailty after 22 years. Further studies are warranted to confirm whether assessing immune-related biomarkers in middle-age may help identify individuals with a higher likelihood of frailty.
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