Short-term and Long-term Outcome Predictions of Older Adults Based on Geriatric Scores: A Prospective Study

Abstract

Objective: With the increasing proportion of older patients (≥80 years) requiring medical care, it becomes highly essential to determine their health outcomes, which will further aid in providing personalized medical care. However, there are limited studies suggesting the use of geriatric scores, namely, frailty score, comorbidity-polypharmacy score (CPS), and Katz index for outcome prediction in the Indian population. Thus, the objective of the current study was to assess the reliability of each of the aforementioned three parameters in predicting the health outcomes (survival) of older patients. Materials and Methods: The study population consisted of 300 patients, aged 80 years and above, admitted to the intensive care unit (n=150) and wards (n=150) during the study period of 18 months. We recorded patient demographics and sequential organ failure assessment scores at 24 hours of hospitalization, categorized patients based on clinical frailty scale (CFS), activities of daily life index and CPS at admission and examined their survival at 30 and 180 days. Results: The prevalence of the older population among the overall patient population in the hospital was estimated to be 8.85%. Through our analyses, we found that both 30-day and 180-day survival rates were decreased with lower Katz scores ≤4 and higher CFS >3 and CPS >7 scores, suggesting the use of the three scores as independent predictors of short-term and long-term outcomes in the older population. Conclusion: We suggest the potential use of the geriatric scores (CFS, CPS, and Katz index) for outcome prediction in the Indian population.