Frailty in the elderly: screening possibilities in Primary Health Care

Abstract

ABSTRACT Objectives: to evaluate two instruments for screening frailty in the elderly in Primary Health Care. Methods: this is an observational, cross-sectional study, with a quantitative approach, with 396 elderly people. SPSS software helped to perform the statistical analyses. The study used the kappa coefficient and Spearman’s correlation. Results: the kappa coefficient between the Clinical-Functional Vulnerability Index 20 and the Edmonton Frailty Scale was 0.496, considered moderate. There was a positive and significant correlation (r = 0.77; p < 0.001) between the frailty conditions and the total score of the two instruments. Conclusions: when this article assessed fragility through the kappa coefficient, both instruments presented positive correlation and agreement. However, the identification of frailty was higher when it used the Edmonton Frailty Scale.

Keywords

• Elderly
• Aging
• Frailty
• Primary Health Care
• Geriatric Evaluation