We witness high rates of visits to emergency departments (ED) and recurrent admissions to acute hospitals by frail elderly. In this paper we described the sociodemographic and clinical variables extracted from 8082 emergency episodes in the Castelo Branco Health Unit, of people aged 65 or over (total episodes of 6 days of each month in 2019). The Rockwood Clinical Frailty Scale (CFS) (2004) and Charlson Comorbidity Index (CCI) were applied. Statistical analysis with IBM SPSS Statistics® version 20, with a significance level of 0.05. The study reveals that the average age is 81.52 years; 57,00% of elderly people admitted to the ED are women; 66.30% married; 54.60% live exclusively with their spouse. 66.20% without formal social support; 51.50% without formal education. 40.90% with two or more admissions to the ED in the last year; almost 29,00% are vulnerable and 44,00% are frail (higher severity levels—14,00%). 79,00% of the elderly presented serious levels of multimorbidity. Furthermore, 15,00% of the elderly who used the ED live in a nursing home, and of these, around 10,00% have severe levels of frailty. Linear regression indicates that there are significant differences in the variables multimorbidity, number of visits to the ED, polypharmacy and increased need for social support depending on the level of frailty.

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Frailty and Multimorbidity in Elderly People Admitted to the Emergency Department

  • Ângela Simões

摘要

We witness high rates of visits to emergency departments (ED) and recurrent admissions to acute hospitals by frail elderly. In this paper we described the sociodemographic and clinical variables extracted from 8082 emergency episodes in the Castelo Branco Health Unit, of people aged 65 or over (total episodes of 6 days of each month in 2019). The Rockwood Clinical Frailty Scale (CFS) (2004) and Charlson Comorbidity Index (CCI) were applied. Statistical analysis with IBM SPSS Statistics® version 20, with a significance level of 0.05. The study reveals that the average age is 81.52 years; 57,00% of elderly people admitted to the ED are women; 66.30% married; 54.60% live exclusively with their spouse. 66.20% without formal social support; 51.50% without formal education. 40.90% with two or more admissions to the ED in the last year; almost 29,00% are vulnerable and 44,00% are frail (higher severity levels—14,00%). 79,00% of the elderly presented serious levels of multimorbidity. Furthermore, 15,00% of the elderly who used the ED live in a nursing home, and of these, around 10,00% have severe levels of frailty. Linear regression indicates that there are significant differences in the variables multimorbidity, number of visits to the ED, polypharmacy and increased need for social support depending on the level of frailty.