Quality of life among frail older people

Abstract

Background: Frailty has a great impact in the wellbeing of older people. Aim: To evaluate the quality of life of older people with and without frailty. Material and Methods: We assessed sociodemographic variables, health, integral geriatric assessment, quality of life using the WHOQoL-BREF questionnaire and the level of fragility using the Tilburg Frailty Indicator (TFI) in 538 participants. Results: Three hundred and five participants aged 73 ± 7 years (229 women) were classified as fragile and 233 aged 72 ± 6 years (125 women) as not having frailty. Compared with their non-fragile counterparts, frail participants had a lower number of years attending school (5.9 and 7.4 respectively), a lower Barther index (93.6 and 98.3 respectively), a lower mini mental score (21.9 and 22.8 respectively) and a higher Yessavage depression score (2.0 and 0.8 respectively). Also, frail participants had a significantly lower total quality of life score and significantly lower scores in the physical and psychological domains. No differences were observed for the social and environmental domains. Older frail participants used health services more frequently than their non-fragile counterparts. Conclusions: In this sample, frailty was associated with a lower quality of life and worse scores in several geriatric assessment tools.