Assessment on frailty and associated factors in elderly male patients

  Background  Frailty is a serious public health problem for the elderly. At present, there is still a basic data insufficiency in the field of aging research.

  Objective  To systematically assess the associated factors of frailty in the elderly and provide epidemiological evidence for formulating intervention strategies.

  Methods  A cross-sectional study was conducted to investigate the health status and function of older male inpatients aged over 65 years in the Second Medical Center of Chinese PLA General Hospital from June 2021 to February 2022. The survey included demographic data, disease history, multiple medication use, nutrition, psychological status, activities of daily living, sleep, cognitive ability, and evaluation of frailty status. Logistic regression model was used to analyze the influencing factors of frailty.

  Results  A total of 249 older male subjects were investigated, with an average age of (84.82 ± 9.24) years. The prevalence of frailty in this population was 45.38%. The results of univariate Logistic regression showed that age, BMI, number of medications taken, number of diseases, nutritional status, depression, activities of daily living, sleep status, cognitive status, gait function (6m walking test), falls, and exercise were associated with the frailty (P <0.05). The results of multivariate Logistic regression showed that activities of daily living (OR: 0.91, 95%CI: 0.83-0.99) and grip strength (OR: 0.78, 95%CI: 0.66-0.92) were associated with the occurrence of frailty (P<0.05).

  Conclusion  The frailty in the elderly male population is accompanied with the decline of grip strength and activities of daily living.