Cluster of factors associated with physical frailty in community-dwelling elderly people

Abstract

Frailty is characterized as a set of factors related to the body structure that lead the subject to a process of physical vulnerability, increasing their dependence. The study aims to investigate the aggregation of factors related to physical frailty (PF) in elderly residents of a city with a low Human Development Index (HDI). This is a cross-sectional study carried out in the city of Ibicuí, state of Bahia, Brazil, and including a random 270 elderly people aged ≥ 60 years. The physical frailty condition was identified according to the criteria proposed by Fried and collaborators. In the data analysis, descriptive statistics, cluster analysis, and multinominal logistic regression procedures were used. The highest prevalence of aggregation was identified when the four risk factors were combined: weight loss, strength, walking speed and physical activity levels (O/E = 4.36; CI = 4.04-4.68). It was identified that older people (80 years old or more) with a lower level of education (unlettered) were more likely to have three or more risk factors for physical frailty (p <0.05). As for sociodemographic variables, those who were older and had lower levels of education were more likely to have three or more risk factors. The development of actions that encourage a healthier lifestyle to favor the prevention and treatment of physical frailty, as well as to increase health literacy and knowledge, may reduce the problems related to this condition in older adults, mainly thinking about the next generations.