Frailty in the elderly: screening possibilities in Primary Health Care

Abstract

ABSTRACT Objectives: to evaluate two instruments for screening frailty in the elderly in Primary Health Care. Methods: this is an observational, cross-sectional study, with a quantitative approach, with 396 elderly people. SPSS software helped to perform the statistical analyses. The study used the kappa coefficient and Spearman’s correlation. Results: the kappa coefficient between the Clinical-Functional Vulnerability Index 20 and the Edmonton Frailty Scale was 0.496, considered moderate. There was a positive and significant correlation (r = 0.77; p < 0.001) between the frailty conditions and the total score of the two instruments. Conclusions: when this article assessed fragility through the kappa coefficient, both instruments presented positive correlation and agreement. However, the identification of frailty was higher when it used the Edmonton Frailty Scale.