Active clinical trials for "Frailty"

Recent interventional studies have shown that frailty can be improved by modifying dietary quality. In this study, a set of nutrition-centric health promotion activities was developed in accordance with the Taiwanese Daily Food Guide for elderly participants of the community centers to improve their nutrition in everyday practice and examined the efficacy of these activities on slowing down the development or regression of frailty. The study was a cluster-randomized controlled trial. Recruited community centers were randomly assigned into either the control or the intervention group. The intervention period lasted for 3 months. Both the control and intervention groups received weekly one-hour group exercise training. The intervention group had an additional weekly one-hour group nutrition session. The intervention programs included: (a) training on-site staffs to use motivational interview techniques to communicate, to estimate participant's energy requirements, and to learn how to provide proper amounts of foods to individual elderlies, (b) nutrition grouped activities on ①know my plate, ②wholegrains, ③drinking teas with dairy, and nuts, ④novel ways to eat fruit and vegetables, ⑤healthy breakfast ideas. In the first month, participants were intervened with the activities laid out above; in the second month, participants were intervened with qualitative discussions on dietary changes; in the third month, participants were intervened with designed activities that helped break down barriers in order to establish a long-term change in dietary habits. Improvement in nutritional status was the primary outcome. Secondary outcomes included frailty scores, physical performance, and mental health. The measurements were performed at baseline, 3 months, and 6 months.

Older patients with cancer constitute a heterogeneous group with varying comorbidity; therefore, geriatric assessment with initial screening is recommended. The Geriatric 8 (G8) has been established as a promising screening tool. Currently, there are no guidelines for oncogeriatric screening in older cancer patients in Denmark. We hypothesize that by screening persons age 70 years or more with newly diagnosed cancer, with the G8, we can assess the prognostic value and identify a subgroup of patients who will benefit from a CGA. Aims: Determine whether Danish cancer patients, with a G8 score of ≤14, experience poorer quality of life (QoL), receive less recommended standard cancer treatment, experience more treatment-related toxicity, stop treatment earlier, and experience shorter survival than patients with a G8 score >14. Ascertain whether the standard G8 cut-off score of ≤14 is the most relevant cut-off score, with respect to treatment adherence, treatment-related toxicity, QoL, and survival, when focusing on the older Danish cancer patient population. Establish whether the performance and prognostic value of the G8 can be strengthened through the addition of a functional measure, the 30-second chair stand test (30-CST), and/ or the handgrip strength test (HGST). Evaluate the prognostic value of the modified Geriatric 8 (mG8) Methods: A prospective, descriptive study of all outpatients with newly diagnosed solid tumors at the Department of Oncology, Odense University Hospital, age 70 years or more. Patients will be screened with the G8, mG8, 30-CST, HGST, and QoL questionnaires at baseline with subsequent one-year follow-up, to determine the prognostic value of the G8 and the mG8. An initial two-month pilot study will help determine inclusion rates and highlight necessary practical adjustments to ensure optimal study participation. Baseline characteristics will be compared with descriptive statistics. Our primary endpoint; Global Health status/ QoL (EORTC QLQ-C30 & QLQ-ELD14), and secondary endpoints; treatment adherence, and treatment-related toxicity, will be assessed using logistical regression; while secondary endpoints; overall survival, cancer-specific survival, will be assessed using the Kaplan Meier analysis and Cox proportional hazard models. Post hoc diagnostic performance analysis will be conducted to determine the optimal G8 cut-off and whether functional measures (30-CST and HGST) can enhance screening accuracy.

Elderly people often have comorbidities. However, there could be a big difference in their health status. Frailty is considered to be relevant to adverse outcomes. Some studies have found that preoperative frailty assessment and comprehensive geriatric assessment (CGA) of the elderly can improve clinical outcomes, but there has been no valid assessment established in China. Therefore it is important to design a research and help to solve this problem.

Frailty is a multifactorial condition associated with older age, which leads to increased vulnerability to external stressors, such as infections or surgical procedures. Key features of frailty are unintentional weight loss, reduced strength and physical activity as well as the feeling of exhaustion. When selecting patients for surgery, frailty can play an important part in resource planning and prognostication. Multiple studies have shown frailty to have a negative impact on mortality, perioperative adverse events, hospital length of stay as well as postoperative quality of life and functional status. Despite it being an important patient-centered outcome, postoperative quality of life tends to be overlooked when selecting patients for surgery. Cardiac surgery presents a massive stressor to the frail patient, but on the other hand might have the ability to reduce disease burden and improve functional status, thus reducing frailty. This prospective observational cohort study aims to assess frailty, as well as functional status and quality of life in cardiosurgical patients pre- and postoperatively, and evaluate its impact on postoperative clinical and functional outcomes. The primary endpoint of this study is the change in postoperative level of frailty.

Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is an infectious disease. Physical distancing is one of the most effective ways to reduce the spread of COVID-19, but this key prevention intervention may have adverse consequences on older adults living at home. Screening older adults living at home and at risk for adverse consequences of physical and social distancing is, therefore, a priority in order to prevent their occurrence. ESOGER ("Evaluation Social et GERiatrique") is a clinical tool designed to: 1) screen the risk-levels for adverse consequences related to COVID-19 physical distancing and 2) to continue appropriate preventive interventions in older adults living at home including frail older patients and older community dwellers. Experience cumulated during the past two weeks revealed that ESOGER could be improved, in order to be more effective and efficient for the prevention of adverse consequences related to COVID-19 physical distancing. This improvement is based on two key components: 1) Comments of Montreal ESOGER users and 2) Analysis of data. Because at this time no information is saved and stored, there is a need to save and store ESOGER information and create the ESOGER databank.

Background Patients less than 80 years of age, who suffer a myocardial infarction (MI) are usually (>90%) offered an early invasive strategy including coronary angiography possibly followed by intervention, preferably percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI). Among non ST-elevation myocardial infarction (NSTEMI) patients, 80 years of age or over, only approximately 40% receive an invasive approach in Sweden, since the majority are handled in a conservative way, i.e. with medical treatment only. Furthermore, as with pharmacological treatment, there is a large variation between Swedish counties regarding the choice of strategy for the treatment of elderly (80+) patients with NSTEMI with an even larger variation between acute hospitals ranging from 20% to 90 %. The Swedish national guidelines for heart disease have emphasized that the patient's biological age, i.e. the patient's biological status and expected length of life, is crucial for decision-making. The Clinical Frailty Scale (CFS) is a global clinical measure of biological age, mixing co-morbidity, disability and cognitive impairment. The investigators have previously reported the potential importance of frailty for short-term (1 month) and medium-term outcome (1 year) in a NSTEMI population. However, published data on the role of frailty´s prognostic value, its capacity to predict adverse effects including complications, and the potential to guide clinical decision-making for elderly patients with myocardial infarction are scarce. Similarly, there is a lack of knowledge of how different patterns of comorbidity burden might influence rational decision-making. Aims To explore the association between frailty and treatment patterns in cardiac care To study the association between outcomes and degree of frailty, with and without comprehensive adjustment for differences in baseline characteristics. To study how treatment benefits for patients admitted to coronary care units differ in patients depending on comorbidities and frailty. Hypothesis The investigators hypothesize that frailty is independently associated with worse outcomes, including mortality, readmissions and complications. Methods and material An observational, register based, multicentre study. Inclusion criteria: Patients consecutively included in the Swedish Web-System for Enhancement and Development of Evidence-Based Care in Heart Disease Evaluated According to Recommended Therapies (SWEDEHEART) registry. Exclusion criteria: None. SWEDEHEART is a national quality registry collecting information on all patients hospitalized with MI or suspected MI. All 72 Swedish hospitals with acute coronary care contribute with data. Briefly, information is collected prospectively about individual patients' medical history, treatment before admission, management during hospital stay, treatment at discharge, and diagnoses. Approximately 20.000 patients diagnosed with MI are included in this register per year. From January 1st 2020 frailty (CFS) is a mandatory variable in the registry. However, as a pilot project to ensure feasibility, five hospitals began to register frailty November 1st, 2017. For the investigators initial analyses data will be used from the pilot study to assess the association between CFS level and outcomes. The data extraction will be done by one of the monitors of the SWEDEHEART registry. After about two years the investigators will extract data prospectively entered into the registry. The frailty instrument The crucial study instrument CFS is a 9-point scale. It has good predictive validity and prognostic power, is relying on clinical judgment, and is relatively easily used in clinical practice. Since the scale includes several degrees it can be considered to be particularly appropriate for risk stratification, and accordingly it has been used for this purpose. The investigators have got the instrument owner´s permission to use this scale. The case record form (CRF) focus on demographic and clinical patient characteristics registered in the SWEDEHEART, particularly those which are supposed to be potential confounders when testing the hypothesis: chronological age, gender, cardiovascular risk, diabetes, heart failure, renal insufficiency, other co-morbidities, including the Charlson Comorbidity Index (CCI), previous MI, medications, ejection fraction, and the classification of MI. Cardiovascular risk will be assessed according to the Global Registry of Acute Coronary Events (GRACE) risk score (GRS). Results from echocardiography, ECGs, laboratory testing and registration of anthropometric data will be included according to routine practice within the frame of SWEDEHEART. Follow-up of cohorts of invasively or conservatively treated patients with different stages of frailty will be done one, three, six, 12, 24 and 36 months after the inclusion point respectively.

The proposed investigation for this study aims to; 1) understand the prevalence and outcomes associated with frailty among haemodialysis patients; 2) ascertain the best frailty assessment tool for haemodialysis patients, and; 3) design a clinical study to explore the feasibility of facilitating, recruiting and executing a multi-disciplinary clinical and psychological intervention to improve frailty status among haemodialysis patients. Work package 1: Firstly, there is a need to understand the prevalence and spectrum of frailty in a UK haemodialysis cohort and what impact frailty has for haemodialysis patients. To investigate this, the investigators will approach every patient on haemodialysis within the local catchment of haemodialysis units and, after informed consent, clinically phenotype their frailty status (pre- and post-haemodialysis for calculation of variability). The frailty phenotyping will encompass a number of frailty assessments (including the Edmonton Frail Scale, Clinical Frailty Scale from Rookwood score and Fried Frailty scale) to identify the ideal frailty assessment tool. All patients in this observational cohort study will be prospectively monitored for clinical/biochemical outcomes using an informatics-based approach for up to 60 months. Work package 2: Building upon the work conducted in work package 1, work package 2 will aim to recruit 50 patients clinically phenotyped with pre-frailty from work package 1 into a feasibility study exploring a multi-disciplinary intervention to improve frailty status. Eligible patients, after informed consent, will be randomised into active or passive intervention. The active intervention will involve a dietitian and physiotherapist who have been trained and accredited with cognitive behavior intervention, utilising established behavioral intervention frameworks, to deliver a multi-disciplinary clinical intervention targeting multiple components of frailty. The FITNESS project will therefore answer some important unanswered questions regarding frailty among the haemodialysis population and help in the design of a large multi-disciplinary intervention study if deemed feasible.

This is a pilot, feasibility study and the purpose of this study is exploratory. The goal is to provide the PI and study team with data using metabolomics that can be used to: a) demonstrate an ability to use such data in a future grant application; b) obtain data that determines the relationship between changes in physical function (objective and subjective) and potential metabolites.

The aim of the study is to determine whether the optimisation of the preoperative nutritional status affects the course of the perioperative period in patients with frailty. Subjects: Patients 65 and over years of age with frailty or risk of it, with suboptimal nutritional status who are prescribed to elective cardiac surgery . Research methods: Edmonton Crispness Scale, a Mini Nutritional Assessment (MNA-SF) test will be used to select subjects. Body composition will be examined by bioelectrical impedance analysis (BIA) to determine the degree of phase angle. Changes in laboratory blood tests will be recorded and evaluated The subjects randomly will be divided into control and study groups. The diet of the patients in the study group will be optimised by protein supplements before elective heart surgery. The benefits of optimising nutritional status will be evaluated comparing laboratory blood tests, changes in organ function, adverse outcomes, the need for vasoactive drugs, artificial lung ventilation time and length of hospitalisation between the groups.

Musculoskeletal aging is one of the major responsibilities and challenges for public health. In particular, sarcopenia correlates with an increased risk of falls and increased morbidity and mortality. With regard to screening for sarcopenia, the guidelines of the European Working Group on Sarcopenia in Older People (EWGSOP2) refer to algorithmic case finding, diagnosis, and quantification of the severity of sarcopenia in clinical. While functional measurements are more difficult to standardize and associated with higher variability, Dual-energy X-ray absorptiometry (DXA) is considered a highly accurate method, even referred to as the "gold standard" to determine muscle mass in the scientific literature. Nevertheless, DXA, which is routinely used, shows inconsistent correlation with functional decline in muscle strength. Another method of muscle quantification is bioelectrical impedance analysis (BIA), a simple, portable instrument that is more readily available and applicable due to its lower cost. However, it tends to overestimate muscle mass and is also more susceptible to a person's hydration status. Because of these difficulties, recent research has focused on the potential of using shear wave elastography. This method indirectly serves to quantify the rapid type II muscle fibers in order to make statements about the muscle quality because an age-related decrease in type II muscle fibers is associated with a more frequent fall frequency. First, the investigators will define three different categories according to the EWGSOP 2 guidelines based on the muscle strength (grip strength, assessed by pneumatic hand dynamometer) and muscle mass (Appendicular skeletal muscle mass, assessed by BIA): "No Sarcopenia", "Probable Sarcopenia" and "Confirmed Sarcopenia". Within these categories, the Investigators would like to establish a multivariate data analysis of different functional measurements with quantitative imaging results. This exploratory trial design is intended to improve understanding within the three categories and to test proxy measurements of different patients who are ruled out for common routine measurements due to, for example, cognitive impairment or pre-existing rheumatic disease. This is essential to consider the heterogeneity of the aging society proportionally.