Impact of frailty in cardiac surgical patients—Assessment, burden, and recommendations

Abstract

Elderly patients undergoing cardiac surgery are at an increased risk of adverse postoperative outcomes. Frailty, a state of decreased physiological reserve, is highly prevalent among elderly patients. Despite being associated with adverse surgical outcomes, no universally accepted definition or measurement tool for frailty exists. Moreover, regardless of all the recommendations, a routine perioperative frailty assessment is often ignored. In addition to complications, frailty increases the burden to the healthcare system, which is of particular concern in Southeast Asia due to its socioeconomically disadvantaged and resource limited settings. This narrative review focuses to develop clinical practice plans for perioperative frailty assessment in the context of a cardiac surgical setting.

Keywords

• cardiac surgery
• frailty
• geriatric
• perioperative
• risk stratification