Introduction and Aim

Frailty is a geriatric syndrome that identifies all of the negative health outcomes such as decreased physiological reserve, stress intolerance, slowness, weakness, low physical activity, burnout, and decreased body mass index. The aim of this study was to determine the frequency of frailty and to determine the factors affecting frailty in people aged 65 years and older living in Manisa.

Materials and Methods

This cross-sectional study was carried out in Şehzadeler district which is an urban settlement in Manisa. The population of the study consists of 3104 people aged 65 and over living in the eight Family Health Center regions in Şehzadeler. The sample size of the study was calculated as 517 people, with 50% prevalence and 5% error rate by means of EPINFO 7.0 program.

The research data were collected by face-to-face interview method. The addresses of the participants were obtained from the family health centers in the region. KATZ Daily Living Activities Scale, Groningen Frailty Scale and Sociodemographic Questionnaire were applied to the participants. Data were evaluated by independent samples t test, chi-square and logistic regression analysis.

Results

The mean age of the participants was 72.83 ± 6.51. Of these, 58.2% were married, 30.42% had no formal education, 17.4% had no regular income, 22.4% were living alone, 84.6% had at leatst one chronic disease (53.8% HT), and 44.5% taking 4 or more drugs per day. According to the Groningen frailty scale, the rate of frail elderly was 63.2%. It was found that women (68%) were more frail than men (57.2%).

In multivariate analyzes, the level of fragility in the participants was higher 2.09 times (95% CI 1.08-4.03) in those without education, 1.45 times (95% CI 1.02-2.07) in those living alone, 2.65 times in those without regular income and 1.96 times (95% CI 1.20-3.21) in those over 75 years.

Conclusion and Recommendations

This study revealed that the frailty of elderly people who are weaker in sociodemographic terms has increased. So elderly people who are over 75 years old are, not educated, living alone, and not to have regular income more frail. Since more than half of the elderly are found to be fragile in our study, frailty is an important health problem of elderly and these elderly people should be monitored more carefully by primary care.

Keywords: aged, frailty, prevalence