Publication Date

1-16-2025

Journal

The Journals of Gerontology: Series A

DOI

10.1093/gerona/glae279

PMID

39549282

PMCID

PMC11775826

PubMedCentral® Posted Date

11-16-2024

PubMedCentral® Full Text Version

Post-print

Published Open-Access

yes

Keywords

Humans, Male, Aged, Female, Middle Aged, Frailty, United States, Life Style, Cross-Sectional Studies, Geriatric Assessment, Frail Elderly, Exercise, Cognitive Dysfunction, Aging, Cognitive function, Health status, Lifestyle

Abstract

BACKGROUND: Multidomain lifestyle interventions may have the potential to slow biological aging as captured by deficit accumulation frailty indices. We describe the distribution and composition of the 49-component frailty index developed by the U.S. POINTER clinical trial team of investigators and assess its cross-sectional associations with sociodemographic factors and markers chosen to be representative of behaviors targeted by the trial's multidomain interventions.

METHODS: We draw baseline data from the 2 111 volunteers enrolled in U.S. POINTER who were ages 60-79 years and at increased risk for cognitive decline. Frailty components were grouped into 9 domains. Associations that frailty index scores and their domains had with behavioral markers were described with correlations and canonical correlation.

RESULTS: The 25th, 50th, and 75th percentiles of the frailty index score distribution were 0.153, 0.189, and 0.235. Higher frailty scores tended to occur among individuals who were older, male, and living in areas of greater deprivation (all p < .001). They were also associated with poorer self-reported diet, less physical activity, and higher Framingham risk scores (all p < .001). Associations were diffusely distributed among the frailty component domains, indicating that no individual domain was dominating associations.

CONCLUSIONS: The U.S. POINTER deficit accumulation frailty index had expected relationships with sociodemographic factors and sensitivity to the behaviors targeted by the trial's interventions. Our analysis supports its use as a secondary outcome to assess whether the multidomain interventions differentially impact an established marker of biological aging. ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier: NCT03688126.

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