PREVALENCE AND ASSOCIATED FACTORS OF PREOPERATIVE FRAILTY AMONG ELDERLY PATIENTS UNDERWENT ELECTIVE SURGERY IN TEACHING HOSPITALS OF SOUTHERN ETHIOPIA, 2023: A MULTICENTER, CROSS-SECTIONAL STUDY

Abstract

Background: Frailty impairs the mental, physical, and emotions, making it difficult to maintain stability. This is especially important for older surgical patients, who are more likely to experience postoperative complications. These complications can lead to disability, loss of independence, decreased quality of life, infections, and death. Understanding this abnormality and its impact on the surgical settings will improve the quality of post-operative care. Objective: To assess the prevalence and associated factors of preoperative frailty among elderly patients underwent elective surgery in selected teaching hospitals of southern Ethiopia, from February 8 to June 7, 2023 GC. Method: A multi-center cross-sectional study was conducted among 422 elderly surgical patients aged 50 years and older. After receiving ethical approval from the institutional review board, data were collected by a systematic random sampling in selected hospital using a semi-structured and pretested questionnaire. The data was then encoded, entered into Epi-Data, and exported to SPSS, version 26. A binary logistic regression analysis was used to identify any associated factors for preoperative frailty, and variables with a P value less than 0.25 were entered into the multivariable logistic regression. A p value of < 0.05 was considered statistically significant. Result: Our study found that the overall prevalence of preoperative frailty is 49.8%. Age 50-64 years [AOR=0.038, 95%CL (0.012-0.128)], female [AOR=2.480 CI (1.004-6.450)], BMI<18.5 [AOR=4.748, 95% CI (2.010-11.216)], preoperative anemia [AOR = 2.386, 95% CI (1.015-5.611)], and absence of preoperative hypertension [AOR = 0.005, 95% CI (0.001-0.024)] were associated with preoperative frailty. Conclusion and recommendation: Preoperative frailty was high among elderly elective surgery patients. This shows that screening for preoperative frailty and associated risk factors is crucial for elderly surgical patients in order to achieve better perioperative quality.