Social frailty among older people

Abstract

Social frailty is a seldom explored concept in older people. There is dissent if it should be considered a multidimensional syndrome or it should be limited to the physical sphere. We conducted a review aiming to develop a concept of social frailty in older people using PubMed, BVS and CINAHL databases. We found ten articles. One exposes the concept of social frailty, nine operationalize social frailty using questions or items on social behavior and two use scales or measuring instruments to classify older people as "socially frail". It is concluded that social frailty is a new concept in gerontology: there are divergences as to whether it should be considered as another dimension of frailty or as an independent concept with a predictive capacity by itself to detect risk among older people.