Habitual fish intake negatively correlates with prevalence of frailty among patients with rheumatoid arthritis

Frailty is a geriatric syndrome characterized by anabolic-catabolic imbalance and multisystem dysregulation resulting in increased adverse health outcomes, and is closely related with dietary habits in the general population. Although chronic inflammatory diseases are thought to accelerate development of frailty, correlations between rheumatoid arthritis (RA), frailty and dietary habits have not been examined. We performed a cross-sectional study using our cohort database (KURAMA cohort), and classified 306 participants into three groups (robust, prefrail and frail) according to the Study of Osteoporotic Fracture (SOF) criteria. Multivariate logistic analysis revealed that the presence of frailty/prefrailty was significantly correlated with the disease activity score (DAS28-ESR) (OR 1.70 (1.30–2.22), p < 0.0001). Additional analyses of frailty and food intake showed that 5 foods (fish, meat, milk, vegetables and fruits) of 20 groups on the questionnaire were inversely associated with the prevalence of frail/prefrail categories. In multivariate analysis with the five nutrients, fish intake (> two times a week) was an independent covariate negatively correlated with frailty/prefrailty (OR 0.35 (0.19–0.63), p = 0.00060). In conclusion, habitual fish intake may play a key role in nutritional intervention to prevent progression of frailty and RA.