Aging clinical and experimental research
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The objective of this study is to investigate the association between multiple antihypertensive use and mortality in residents with diagnosed hypertension, and whether dementia and frailty modify this association. ⋯ Multiple antihypertensive use is associated with an increased risk of mortality in residents with diagnosed hypertension, particularly in residents with dementia and among those who are most frail.
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Review
Is frailty a prognostic factor for adverse outcomes in older patients with acute coronary syndrome?
There is very limited guidance in regard to how biological age should be estimated and how different comorbidity conditions influence the benefit-risk ration of interventions. Frailty is an important health-related problem in patients, especially in older adults. It is a reflection of biologic rather than chronologic age; frailty may explain why there remains substantial heterogeneity in clinical outcomes within the older patients' population. ⋯ Frailty measured by Canadian Study of Health and Aging Clinical Frailty Scale (CSHA-CFS), the Edmonton Frail Scale (EFS), Fried score, Green scores, frailty instrument from the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe (SHARE-FI) index, and FRAIL (Fatigue, Resistance, Ambulation, Illnesses, Loss of weight) scale, leads to significantly higher mortality rates in older patients with ACS.
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Various studies are underway to identify protective variables for the COVID-19 pandemic. We hypothesized that if indeed the vitamin D levels would be protective in the European population, as recently proposed, the correlation would become more robust when the countries had passed the infection peak as on May 12 2020, compared to April 8 2020, when the majority had not. Comparative analysis of data from the mentioned stages indicated a significant increase in negative correlation of vitamin D levels with COVID-19 cases per million population in later stage (r(20): -0.5504; R2 = 0.3029; p value: 0.0119 vs r(20): -0.4435; R2 = 0.1967; p value: 0.0501), whereas the correlation with deaths per million population became insignificant (r(20): -0.3935; R2 = 0.1549; p value: 0.0860 vs r(20): -0.4378; R2 = 0.1917; p value: 0.0535). Considering divergence of vitamin D levels from the mean in subgroups, e.g. children, women, aged, dedicated exploratory studies with carefully chosen matched target groups is advisable.