Publication: Effects of a Modified Hospital Elder Life Program on Frailty in Individuals Undergoing Major Elective Abdominal Surgery
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Date
2014
Published Version
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Wiley-Blackwell
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Citation
Chen, Cheryl Chia-Hui, Chiung-Nien Chen, I-Rue Lai, Guan-Hua Huang, Jane S. Saczynski, and Sharon K. Inouye. 2014. “Effects of a Modified Hospital Elder Life Program on Frailty in Individuals Undergoing Major Elective Abdominal Surgery.” J Am Geriatr Soc 62 (2) (January 17): 261–268. doi:10.1111/jgs.12651.
Research Data
Abstract
Objectives
To test the effects of a modified Hospital Elder Life Program (mHELP) on frailty.
Design
Matched and unmatched analyses of data from a before-and-after study.
Setting
Hospital, inpatient.
Participants
Participants aged 65 years and older ((N = 189) undergoing elective, major abdominal surgery at a medical center in Taiwan.
Intervention
The mHELP included three nursing interventions: early mobilization, oral and nutritional assistance, and orienting communication.
Measurements
Frailty rate and transitions between frailty states from hospital discharge to 3 months after discharge, using Fried's phenotype criteria categorized as: non-frail (0 or 1 criteria present), pre-frail (2 or 3 criteria present), and frail (4 or 5 criteria present).
Results
Among matched pairs, participants who received the mHELP interventions were significantly less likely to be frail at discharge (19.2% vs. 65.4% for controls; adjusted OR = .10, 95% CI = .02 to .39) than their matched controls. Transitions to states of greater frailty during hospitalization were more common for participants in the control group. At 3 months post-discharge, participants who received the mHELP intervention during hospitalization were less likely to be frail than the matched controls (17.3% versus 23.1%; adjusted OR = .73; 95% CI = .21 to 2.56), although this difference did not achieve statistical significance.
Conclusion
The mHELP intervention is effective in reducing frailty by hospital discharge but the benefit is diminished by 3 months post-discharge. Thus, the mHELP provides a useful approach to manage in-hospital frailty for older patients undergoing major abdominal surgery.
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Keywords
frailty, aged, intervention studies, surgery, geriatric syndromes
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