Poor self-perceived health is associated with frailty and prefrailty in urban living older adults: A cross-sectional analysis

Abstract

In this study, we investigated the cross-sectional association of Self-perceived health (SPH) with frailty phenotype. A total of 4632 participants of the Beijing Longitudinal Study of Aging II (mean age 75.4±6.8years) were categorized into having good, fair, and poor SPH. Individuals were compared according to their frailty status (i.e., frail and prefrail vs robust) with SPH rating. The association of SPH with respect to the five components of frailty phenotype was further investigated. Older adults who were frail had lower odds of having good SPH (OR=0.64). Whereas frail and prefrail individuals had higher odds of having poor SPH (OR=6.26,OR=2.09 respectively). Having low education, polypharmacy, ADL and IADL disability, cognitive impairment, and depression was associated with a higher likelihood of having poor SPH. All components of frailty except weight loss was associated with poor SPH. SPH may serve as a tool to identify frail or prefrail individuals in the community.