title: The Impact of Frailty on Post-Acute Rehabilitation Outcomes in Older Adults.
abstract: Objective, Design, Measurements: We assessed the correlations of the Frailty Instrument for primary care of the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe (SHARE-FI on admission: non-frail, pre-frail, frail) with the outcomes of a Short-term Post-Acute Rehabilitative Care programme (N=172 admissions over one-year period, 95 of which were frail).
  
  
  RESULTS
  SHARE-FI correlated with age (non-frail: mean 79.2 years; frail: 83.6; P<0.001). Adjusting for age, SHARE-FI correlated with longer length of stay (non-frail: median 30 days; frail: 42; P=0.047), higher rate of emergency transfer to acute hospital (non-frail: 2.4%; frail: 21.1%; P=0.004), and lower home discharge rate (non-frail: 97.6%; frail: 81.9%; P=0.009). While frailty correlated with more disability on admission and discharge, there was no statistically significant difference in Barthel Index (BI) improvement across frailty categories (all groups had median BI improvement of ≥2 points, P=0.247).
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  The post-acute rehabilitation of the frail is worthwhile but requires more time and access to acute hospital facilities.
authors.affiliation: Dr. Roman Romero-Ortuno, Department of Medical Gerontology, Trinity College Dublin, Trinity Centre for Health Sciences, St James's Hospital, James's Street, Dublin 8, Ireland, Email: romeror@tcd.ie, Telephone: +353 1 896 3555, Fax: +353 1 896 3407.
authors.forename: R
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Romero-Ortuno
authors.forename: C
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Tiernan
authors.forename: L
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Cogan