Commentary: In cardiac surgery, you are only as old as you feel

There is broad consensus among experts that frailty is associated with worse outcomes after cardiac surgery. In the last year alone, there have been numerous studies devoted to the subject, providing evidence that frailty predicts greater mortality, greater resource use, and lower functional outcomes and even dictates the nature and location of discharge from the hospital.1-5 As a result, not only are select markers of frailty now incorporated into the Society of Thoracic Surgeons database, but groups are calling for more comprehensive preoperative frailty screening as a means to identify and triage patients at greatest risk.