Prevalence and correlates of frailty in an older rural African population: findings from the HAALSI cohort study.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Frailty is a key predictor of death and dependency, yet little is known about frailty in sub-Saharan Africa despite rapid population ageing. We describe the prevalence and correlates of phenotypic frailty using data from the Health and Aging in Africa: Longitudinal Studies of an INDEPTH Community cohort.

Methods

We analysed data from rural South Africans aged 40 and over. We used low grip strength, slow gait speed, low body mass index, and combinations of self-reported exhaustion, decline in health, low physical activity and high self-reported sedentariness to derive nine variants of a phenotypic frailty score. Each frailty category was compared with self-reported health, subjective wellbeing, impairment in activities of daily living and the presence of multimorbi

SUBMITTER: Payne CF 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5745732 | biostudies-literature | 2017 Dec

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature