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Risk of Frailty According to the Values of the Ankle-Brachial Index in the Toledo Study for Healthy Aging

  • Original Research
  • Physical Frailty
  • Published:
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Abstract

Background

Vascular function (VF) is a general term used to describe the regulation of blood flow, arterial pressure, capillary recruitment, filtration and central venous pressure, it’s well known that age has direct effects on the VF, and this may affect the frailty status.

Objectives

To analyse the association between Frailty Trait Scale 5 (FTS 5) with VF and its changes at values below and above a nadir.

Design

Prospective population-based cohort study.

Setting and Participants

Data from 1.230 patients were taken from the first wave (2006–2009) of the Toledo Study for Healthy Aging.

Measurements

Frailty was evaluated using FTS 5, which evaluates 5 items: Body mass index, progressive Romberg, physical activity, usual gait speed and hand grip strength. VF was assessed using the ankle-brachial index (ABI) as an indirect measure of VF. Screening for cardiovascular and cerebrovascular disease was also performed by self-reporting and by searching medical records, and was used as exclusion criteria.

Results

The optimal ABI cut-off point that maximized the adjusted R2 was 1.071. We observed a statistically significant association for FTS 5 score above and below the ABI cut-off points. For every tenth that the ABI decreased below the cut-off point the patient had an increase in the FTS 5 score of 0.47 points and in every tenth that increased above the cut-off point the increase in the FTS 5 score was 0.41 points. Of all FTS 5 items, the gait speed was the only item that showed a significant association with an ABI changes 0.28 and 0.21 points for every tenth below and above the cut-off point, respectively.

Conclusions

Frailty is highly associated with VF. In addition, FTS 5 and its gait speed criteria are useful to detect VF impairments, via changes in ABI.

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Acknowledgments

We would like to thank the support received by grants from the European Union (the Centro de Investigación Biomédica en Red de Fragilidad y Envejecimiento Saludable (CIBERFES) and FEDER funds), from the Instituto de Salud Carlos III, from FISCAM (Junta de Comunidades de Castilla-La Mancha, Spain), and from FP7-Health-2012-Innovation (European Union).

Funding

Funding: This work was supported by grants [CB16/10/00456 and CB16/10/00464] from the European Union (the Centro de Investigación Biomédica en Red de Fragilidad y Envejecimiento Saludable (CIBERFES) and FEDER funds), [PI15/01305] from the Instituto de Salud Carlos III (Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación, Spain), [DEP2015-69386-R and RD12/0043] from the Instituto de Salud Carlos III (Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad, Spain), [PI2010/020] from FISCAM (Junta de Comunidades de Castilla-La Mancha, Spain), and [FP7- 305483-2] (“Frailomic Iniciative”) from FP7-Health-2012-Innovation (European Union).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Hospital Geriatrico Virgen del Valle, Hospital Virgen del Valle, Toledo, Spain

    F. Quiñónez-Bareiro, A. Alfaro-Acha, C. Rosado-Artalejo, M. C. Grau-Jimenez & Francisco Jose García-Garcia

  2. Getafe University Hospital, Hospital Universitario de Getafe, Madrid, Spain

    J. A. Carnicero & L. Rodriguez-Mañas

  3. Hospital Virgen del Valle, Complejo Hospitalario de Toledo, Crta de Cobisa s/n, 45071, Toledo, Spain

    Francisco Jose García-Garcia

Authors
  1. F. Quiñónez-Bareiro
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  2. J. A. Carnicero
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  3. A. Alfaro-Acha
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  4. C. Rosado-Artalejo
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  5. M. C. Grau-Jimenez
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  6. L. Rodriguez-Mañas
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  7. Francisco Jose García-Garcia
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Francisco Jose García-Garcia.

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Conflicts of interest: The authors declare no conflicts of interest.

Ethical Standards: This work was performed according to the ethical standards laid down in the 1964 Declaration of Helsinki and later amendments; complies with Spanish law on biomedical research and obtained approval by our centre’s Clinical Research Ethics Committee.

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Quiñónez-Bareiro, F., Carnicero, J.A., Alfaro-Acha, A. et al. Risk of Frailty According to the Values of the Ankle-Brachial Index in the Toledo Study for Healthy Aging. J Frailty Aging 12, 24–29 (2023). https://doi.org/10.14283/jfa.2022.25

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.14283/jfa.2022.25

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