The feasibility of assessing frailty and sarcopenia in hospitalised older people: a comparison of commonly used tools.

Background: Frailty and sarcopenia are common amongst hospitalised older people and associated with poor healthcare outcomes. Widely recognised tools for their identification are the Fried Frailty Phenotype, its self-report version the FRAIL Scale, and the European Working Group on Sarcopenia in Older People (EWGSOP) criteria. We studied the feasibility of using these tools in a hospital setting of acute wards for older people.

Can trained volunteers improve the mealtime care of older hospital patients? An implementation study in one English hospital.

Objective: Multinational studies report undernutrition among 39% older inpatients; importantly, malnutrition risk may further increase while in hospital. Contributory factors include insufficient mealtime assistance from time-pressured hospital staff. A pilot study showed trained volunteers could safely improve mealtime care.