ArticleThe journals of gerontology. Series A, Biological sciences and medical sciences2018
Delirium, Frailty, and Mortality: Interactions in a Prospective Study of Hospitalized Older People.
Article in The journals of gerontology. Series A, Biological sciences and medical sciences, 2018. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 42 papers, 5 of them syntheses that pooled it.
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
42 citing papers in PubMed, 5 syntheses or guidelines pooled it.
- Mortality Risk Following Delirium in Older Inpatients: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis.Worldviews on evidence-based nursing · 2025Pooled it
- Frailty and delirium in hospitalized older adults: A systematic review with meta-analysis.Revista latino-americana de enfermagem · 2022Pooled it
- Non-pharmacological interventions for preventing delirium in hospitalised non-ICU patients.The Cochrane database of systematic reviews · 2021Pooled it
- Non-pharmacological interventions for preventing delirium in hospitalised non-ICU patients.The Cochrane database of systematic reviews · 2021Pooled it
- A call to action for delirium research: Meta-analysis and regression of delirium associated mortality.BMC geriatrics · 2020Pooled it
- "Pleasantly confused" and missed opportunities for delirium recognition: A hospital record audit.International journal of nursing studies advances · 2026Article
- Associations of postoperative delirium with perioperative frailty worsening and their combined effect on 1-year mortality in older surgical patients: a prospective cohort study.European geriatric medicine · 2026Article
- Association of Frailty and Delirium with Hospitalization Outcomes Among Older Adults With Rheumatic Diseases.ACR open rheumatology · 2026Article
- Delirium is associated with incident dementia across the multimorbidity spectrum: a population-based cohort study.medRxiv : the preprint server for health sciences · 2025Article
- Occurrence, associated factors, and outcomes of delirium in patients in an adult acute general medicine service in England: a 10-year longitudinal, observational study.The lancet. Healthy longevity · 2025Observational
- Delirium risk and mortality in people with pre-existing severe mental illness: a retrospective cohort study using linked datasets in England.Psychological medicine · 2024Article
- Impact of Frailty and Delirium Among Older Adults Admitted With Acute Decompensated Heart Failure.JACC. Advances · 2024Article
- Between a Rock and a Hard Place: Risks of Delirium and Frailty in Heart Failure Patients.JACC. Advances · 2024Article
- Factors associated with delirium in a real-world acute-care setting: analysis considering the interdependence of clinical variables with the frailty syndrome.European geriatric medicine · 2024Article
- To Be Frail or Not to Be Frail: This Is the Question-A Critical Narrative Review of Frailty.Journal of clinical medicine · 2024Review
- Electroencephalography as a tool for assessing delirium in hospitalized patients: A single-center tertiary hospital experience.Journal of central nervous system disease · 2024Article
- Application of laboratory frailty index in predicting delirium in elderly patients with community-acquired pneumonia.Frontiers in aging · 2024Article
- Prevalence and outcomes of frailty in unplanned hospital admissions: a systematic review and meta-analysis of hospital-wide and general (internal) medicine cohorts.EClinicalMedicine · 2023Article
- A Case of Persistent Postictal and Inter-ictal Delirium.Kansas journal of medicine · 2023Article
- The possible role of gut microbiota dysbiosis in the pathophysiology of delirium in older persons.Microbiome research reports · 2023Review
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
6 authors.
Funding
Abstract
Background: It is unknown whether the association between delirium and mortality is consistent for individuals across the whole range of health states. A bimodal relationship has been proposed, where delirium is particularly adverse for those with underlying frailty, but may have a smaller effect (perhaps even protective) if it is an early indicator of acute illness in fitter people. We investigated the impact of delirium on mortality in a cohort simultaneously evaluated for frailty. Methods: We undertook an exploratory analysis of a cohort of consecutive acute medical admissions aged ≥70. Delirium on admission was ascertained by psychiatrists. A frailty index (FI) was derived according to a standard approach. Deaths were notified from linked national mortality statistics. Cox regression was used to estimate associations between delirium, frailty, and their interactions on mortality. Results: The sample consisted of 710 individuals. Both delirium and frailty were independently associated with increased mortality rates (delirium: HR 2.4, 95% CI 1.8-3.3, p < .01; frailty (per SD): HR 3.5, 95% CI 1.2-9.9, p = .02). Estimating the effect of delirium in tertiles of FI, mortality was greatest in the lowest tertile: tertile 1 HR 3.4 (95% CI 2.1-5.6); tertile 2 HR 2.7 (95% CI 1.5-4.6); tertile 3 HR 1.9 (95% CI 1.2-3.0). Conclusion: Although delirium and frailty contribute to mortality, the overall impact of delirium on admission appears to be greater at lower levels of frailty. In contrast to the hypothesis that there is a bimodal distribution for mortality, delirium appears to be particularly adverse when precipitated in fitter individuals.
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