Frailty is associated with lower likelihoods of being placed on the kidney transplant waitlist and of receiving a transplant, according to a study that presented at ASN Kidney Week 2018.

To investigate whether frailty in patients with kidney failure may affect their likelihood of receiving a kidney transplant, Christine Haugen, MD (Johns Hopkins Hospital) and her colleagues studied 7078 potential kidney transplant candidates from 2009 to 2017. Patients were considered frail if they had 3 or more of the following components: unintentional weight loss, decreased grip strength, slowed walking speed, and low activity.

Frail participants were 38 percent less likely to be listed for transplantation, had nearly twofold increased risk of dying while on the transplant waitlist mortality, and underwent transplantation at a 35 percent lower rate than nonfrail participants.

“Prehabilitation may be a useful tool to increase physiologic reserve and subsequently improve access to kidney transplantation among frail patients,” says Haugen.