315 Cardiac surgery in the elderly: the underestimate role of frailty in the decision making
Authors: Campana Pasquale , Conte Maddalena , Palaia Maria Emiliana , Petraglia Laura , Ferro Adele , Comentale Giuseppe , Pilato Emanuele , Leosco Dario , Parisi Valentina 
Published: December 2021

Aims

Elders represent the most common population with indication to cardiac surgery, also presenting the highest mortality/disability after interventions. Both for valve and coronary artery surgery the estimation of the surgical risk, including the frailty assessment, is recommended to guide the decision making. However, frailty results not exhaustively assessed by the commonly used surgical risk scores such as EuroSCORE I-II and score of the Society of Thoracic Surgeons and is mostly used the Kat’s Index (included in the latest European guidelines). This study aims at establishing the feasibility and the value of a Comprehensive Geriatric Assessment (CGA) in elderly undergoing cardiac surgery.

Methods

From June 2021we consecutively enrolled 50 elderly patients undergoing cardiac surgery (age &gt; 65 years old). All patients underwent CGA with an expert geriatrician and the demographic, biometrics, clinical and echocardiographic data were collected. We evaluated frailty and disability (Kats index, Barthel Index and Frailty Index FI), cognitive status (Montreal Cognitive Assessment MOCA, Mini Mental State Examination MMSE and Geriatric Depression Scale), physical status (Tinetti test, Short Performance Physical Battery SPPB, Physical Activity Scale for the Elderly PASE and 6-min Walking test), delirium condition, sarcopenia and nutritional status (Mini-Nutritional Assessment MNA). A clinical, echocardiographic, and geriatric 3-month follow-up is planned. In particular, we are evaluating the impact of frailty, assessed by CGA, on peri-surgical outcome and the potential additive value of a CGA on the commonly used surgical risk-scores and Kat’s Index. Furthermore, we are assessing the impact of cardiac surgery of frail elderly at GCA.

Results

The CGA was feasible in all patients and lasted 1 h/patient. In our baseline data, only 23% of the enrolled patients resulted ‘frail’ according to Kat’s Index. However, in the remaining 77% of the study population, the CGA have identified 30% of patients with increased frailty index and 30% with disability, assessed by Barthel Index and physical function indexes (PASE and SPPB). In these patient, frailty and disability were associated to impaired nutritional status, assessed at MNA. Furthermore, 40% of the patients of this group resulted sarcopenic at the hand grip test. The cognitive valuation has shown a cognitive impairment in the 20% of patients at the MMSE and the 70 % at the MOCA. Of note, the 40% of the patients resulted to suffer of depression, not diagnosed before the GCA. At mid-November 2021 the follow-up will be completed.

Conclusions

The preliminary results of the presents study suggest that in patients undergoing cardiac surgery frailty is currently underdiagnosed. The follow-up analysis will establish if a CGA has an additive value on common surgical risk estimators. This study has a potential impact on the risk stratification of elderly patients undergoing invasive procedures and defines the need of a geriatrician in the heart team.