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Beyond Chronological Age: Frailty and Multimorbidity Predict In-Hospital Mortality in Patients With COVID-19

Background: We evaluated whether frailty and multimorbidity predict in-hospital mortality in patients with COVID-19 beyond chronological age. Methods: 165 patients admitted from March 8th to April 17th, 2020, with COVID-19 in an acute geriatric ward in Italy were included. Pre-disease frailty was as...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Zucchelli, Alberto, Marengoni, Alessandra, Vetrano, Davide, Ferrucci, Luigi, Fratiglioni, Laura, Bernabei, Roberto, Onder, Graziano, Romanelli, Giuseppe
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Oxford University Press 2021
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8679506/
http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/geroni/igab046.055
Descripción
Sumario:Background: We evaluated whether frailty and multimorbidity predict in-hospital mortality in patients with COVID-19 beyond chronological age. Methods: 165 patients admitted from March 8th to April 17th, 2020, with COVID-19 in an acute geriatric ward in Italy were included. Pre-disease frailty was assessed with the Clinical Frailty Scale (CFS). Multimorbidity was defined as the co-occurrence of ≥2 of these in the same patient. The hazard (HR) of in-hospital mortality as a function of CFS score and number of chronic diseases in the whole population and in those aged 70+ years were calculated. Results Among the 165 patients, 112 were discharged, 11 were transferred to intensive care units and 42 died. Patients who died were older (81.0 vs. 65.2 years, p<0.001), more frequently multimorbid (97.6 vs. 52.8%; p<0.001) and more likely frail (37.5 vs. 4.1%; p<0.001). Less than 2.0% of patients without multimorbidity and frailty, 28% of those with multimorbidity only and 75% of those with both multimorbidity and frailty died. Each unitary increment in the CFS was associated with a higher risk of in-hospital death in the whole sample (HR=1.3; 95%CI=1.05-1.62) and in patients aged 70+ years (HR=1.29;95%CI=1.04-1.62), whereas the number of chronic diseases was not significantly associated with higher risk of death. The CFS addition to age and sex increased mortality prediction by 9.4% in those aged 70+ years. Conclusions Frailty identifies patients with COVID-19 at risk of in-hospital death independently of age. Multimorbidity contributes to prognosis because of the very low probability of death in its absence.