TY  - INPR
N1  - © 2024 The Author(s). Published by Elsevier Ltd on behalf of British Journal of Anaesthesia. This is an open access article under the CC BY license (http://
creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
KW  - ageing; epidemiology; frailty syndrome; geriatric medicine; multimorbidity; perioperative care; surgery
PB  - Elsevier BV
A1  - Swarbrick, Claire Jane
A1  - Williams, Karen
A1  - Evans, Bob
A1  - Blake, Helen Abigail
A1  - Poulton, Thomas
A1  - Nava, Samuel
A1  - Shah, Akshay
A1  - Martin, Peter
A1  - Louise Partridge, Judith Stephanie
A1  - Moppett, Iain Keith
JF  - British Journal of Anaesthesia
TI  - Characteristics of older patients undergoing surgery in the UK: SNAP-3, a snapshot observational study
SN  - 0007-0912
Y1  - 2025/01//
AV  - public
N2  - Background: Frailty and multimorbidity are common in older adults, but the prevalence and interaction of these conditions in surgical patients remain unclear. This study describes the clinical characteristics of a heterogeneous cohort of
older UK surgical patients.
Methods: We conducted a prospective observational cohort study during 5 days in March 2022, aiming to recruit all UK
patients aged 60 yr and older undergoing surgery, excluding minor procedures (e.g. cataract surgery). Data were collected
on patient characteristics, clinical care, frailty, and multimorbidity measures.
Results: A total of 7134 patients from 214 NHS hospitals were recruited, with a mean (SD) age of 72.8 (8.1) yr. Of all operations, 69% (95% confidence interval [CI] 67.9e70.1%) were elective, and 34% (95% CI 32.7e34.8%) were day cases. Of the
patients, 19% (95% CI 18.3e20.1%) were living with frailty (Clinical Frailty Score 5), and 63.1% (95% CI 62.0e64.3%) were
living with multimorbidity (count of 2 comorbidities). Those living with frailty, multimorbidity, or both were typically
older, were from lower socioeconomic backgrounds, and experienced greater polypharmacy and reduced independence.
Patients living with frailty were less likely to undergo elective and day-case surgeries. Four out of five (78.8% [1079/1369])
of those who were living with frailty were also living with multimorbidity; 27.1% (1079/3978) of those who were living
with multimorbidity were also living with frailty.
Conclusions: In the UK, one in five older patients undergoing surgery is living with frailty, and almost two-thirds of older
patients are living with multimorbidity. These data highlight the importance of frailty screening. In addition, they can
serve to guide resource allocation and provide comparative estimates for future research.
ID  - discovery10203031
UR  - https://doi.org/10.1016/j.bja.2024.11.024
ER  -