BACKGROUND: The term frailty refers to a condition of increased vulnerability to stressors among older @entity1 , leading to a decline in homeostatic reserve. Frailty often leads to falls, hospitalisation and mortality, hence its importance for the delivery of health care to older adults. The pathophysiological mechanisms behind frailty are not well understood, but the decreased @entity479 -hormone production and elevated @entity32 of older @entity1 appear to be major contributors. METHOD: We used a sample of 3,160 individuals aged 50 or older from the English Longitudinal Study of Ageing and assessed their frailty status according to a Frailty Index. We selected 620 single @entity4334 polymorphisms in genes involved in the @entity479 hormone or inflammatory pathways. We performed linear association analysis. The outcome variable was the square root transformation of the Frailty Index, with age and sex entered as covariates. RESULTS: The strongest signal was detected in the pro-inflammatory @entity8923 gene ( @entity48785 , P = 0.0021, b = -0.015). Further significant signals were observed in the Interleukin-12 ( @entity68413 , P = 0.0062, b = -0.008 and @entity68414 , P = 0.0077, b = -0.008), @entity8993 ( @entity68415 , P = 0.0065, b = 0.011) and @entity8729 ( @entity68416 , P = 0.0097, b = -0.01) genes. None of these associations remain significant after Bonferroni correction. CONCLUSIONS: We show potential associations between genetic variants of four genes and the frailty index. These genes are involved in the @entity165 transport and inflammatory pathway and, as such, our results provide further support for the involvement of the immunological processes in frailty of the elderly.

Genetic variant of XXXX gene is associated with the Frailty Index in the English Longitudinal Study of Ageing.

@entity1 :: ('9606', 'Species') :: ['people'] @entity32 :: ('MESH:D007249', 'Disease') :: ['chronic systemic inflammation'] @entity68413 :: ('rs4679868', 'SNP') :: ['rs4679868'] @entity68415 :: ('rs1799986', 'SNP') :: ['rs1799986'] @entity8993 :: ('4035', 'Gene') :: ['low density lipoprotein receptor-related protein 1'] @entity68416 :: ('rs6131', 'SNP') :: ['rs6131'] @entity68414 :: ('rs9852519', 'SNP') :: ['rs9852519'] @entity8923 :: ('3606', 'Gene') :: ['Interleukin-18'] @entity8729 :: ('6403', 'Gene') :: ['Selectin-P'] @entity165 :: ('MESH:D002784', 'Chemical') :: ['cholesterol'] @entity4334 :: ('D009711', 'Chemical') :: ['nucleotide'] @entity48785 :: ('rs360722', 'SNP') :: ['rs360722'] @entity479 :: ('D013256', 'Chemical') :: ['steroid']
@entity8923 :: (3606,Gene) :: ['Interleukin-18']
