Purpose: Frailty is a state of physical and cognitive decline that exists between robust health and the need for nursing care. Frailty is reported to occur at a high rate among patients with cancer and is associated with postoperative complications, such as delirium, infection, reduced survival, and rehospitalization. In this study, we investigated the incidence of frailty and surgical outcomes in patients who underwent surgery for gastrointestinal cancer.Methods: A total of 201 patients who underwent preoperative physical assessment at Osaka International Cancer Institute between July and September 2021 were included. The Japanese version of the Cardiovascular Health Study (J-CHS) index was used to assess the frequency of frailty and related postoperative outcomes.Results: Among the 201 patients, 27 (13%) were classified as frail and 126 (63%) as pre-frail. Of the 27 frail patients, 22 (81%) were older adults—a significantly higher proportion compared to the pre-frail/robust group (P=0.004). The median hospital stay for frail patients was 17 days (range, 5–98 days), which was significantly longer than that for robust patients (P<0.001). Postoperative complications occurred in 13 frail patients (48%), which was higher than in pre-frail (n=36, 29%) and robust (n=6, 13%) patients. Furthermore, multivariate analysis showed that frailty was an independent risk factor for postoperative complications.Conclusion: These findings indicate that frailty is common among older adults with gastrointestinal cancer and has a significant impact on both the length of hospital stay and the risk of postoperative complications.
Yasueda et al. (Mon,) studied this question.
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