Correlation between frailty index of elder inpatients and life quality of their primary caregivers

Abstract

Objective To explore the correlation between frailty index of elder patients and quality of life of primary caregivers. Methods Using convenience sampling method, 240 elderly inpatients and their main caregivers in Beijing Friendship Hospital, Capital Medical University from January to December 2017 were selected. According to the results of the Chinese version of Care Partner-Frailty Index-Comprehensive Geriatric Assessment (CP-FI-CGA) Questionnaire survey, the patients were divided into mild frailty group ( 0.5) with 87 patients, the MOS Item Short Form (SF-36) was used to evaluate the life quality of the main caregivers in each group and Spearman correlation analysis was used to analyze the correlation between the frailty index and the life quality of the main caregivers. Results The CP-FI-CGA index (0.40±0.10) of elderly inpatients ranged from 0.03 to 0.87, which was at a moderate level of frailty. With the increase of the frailty index of elderly inpatients, the four dimensions of overall health, vitality, social functioning and role emotional of the main caregivers in each group gradually decreased, with statistical significance (P 0.05) . Conclusions The elderly inpatients are at a moderate level of frailty, the degree of frailty may mainly affect the quality of life of the main caregivers in the field of mental health. Key words: Aged; Frailty; Primary caregivers; Quality of life; Correlation analysis