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The association between social vulnerability and frailty in community dwelling older people: a systematic review

  • Hertfordshire Partnership University National Health Service (NHS) Foundation Trust
Research Output: Contribution to journal Review article Peer-review

Open access

Abstract

The aim of this systematic literature review was to determine whether social vulnerability is associated with frailty in older people. Databases were searched for literature from January 2001 to March 2022. Hand searches of reference lists of the selected articles were also used to identify other relevant studies. Studies that met the inclusion criteria were selected. Two independent reviewers assessed the methodological quality using an established tool. Eleven eligible studies from Canada, Europe, USA, Tanzania, Mexico, and China were selected. The level of social vulnerability measured by the Social Vulnerability Index (SVI) from a meta-analysis was 0.300 (95% CI: 0.242, 0.358), with the highest SVI in Tanzania (0.49), while the lowest level of SVI was reported in China (0.15). The highest frailty level of 0.32 was observed in both Tanzania and Europe, with the lowest frailty reported in a USA study from Hawaii (0.15). In all studies, social vulnerability was a significant predictor of mortality for both sexes at subsequent data collection points. The association between SVI and frailty was high in Tanzania (r = 0.81), with other studies reporting stronger correlations for females compared to males, but at small to moderate levels. In one study, an increase of 1SD in SVI was linked to a 20% increase in frailty score at a subsequent evaluation. Additional study is warranted to determine a potential causality between social vulnerability and frailty.

Publication Information

Output type

Research Output: Contribution to journal Review article Peer-review

Original language

English

Article number

104

Pages from-to (Number of pages)

Pages 1-10

Journal (Volume, Issue Number)

Geriatrics (Switzerland) (Volume 7, Issue 5)

Publication milestones

  • Accepted/In press - 22/09/2022
  • Published - 26/09/2022

Publication status

Published - 26/09/2022

ISSN

2308-3417

External Publication IDs

  • handle.net: 10547/625538
  • Scopus: 85140628529
  • PubMed: 36286207

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