Influence of frailty on the quality of life patients qualified for pacemaker implantation

Aims and objectives: An important question is whether frailty syndrome affects the assessment of quality of life or whether frailty syndrome may reduce the benefits of a cardiac pacemaker implantation.

Background: Frailty syndrome is known risk factor for quality of life evaluation after selected cardiology invasive procedures.

Design: The study was designed as single-centre prospective study.

Methods: The study included 171 patients aged ≥60 years who were qualified for pacemaker implantation. Quality of life was evaluated twice-before and 6 months after implantation using MLHF questionnaire. A frailty syndrome evaluation using the Tilburg Frailty Indicator (TFI) was performed prior to pacemaker implantation. A DDDR pacemaker was implanted in each patient.

Results: Frailty syndrome was identified in half of the patients with indications for cardiac pacemaker implantation. There was an improvement in quality of life in the six months after pacemaker implantation in all of the robust and frailty syndrome-affected patients that were included into the study-in general, physical and emotional domains.

Conclusion: Implantation of cardiac pacemaker influences the compensation quality of life evaluation in patients with sinus node dysfunction. Presence of frailty influences worse quality of life of patients when evaluated before cardiac pacemaker implantation.

Relevance to clinical practice: Frailty should be evaluated in all older patients qualified for pacemaker implantation to evaluate high-risk group, optimise therapeutic approach and to intense education activities for patients and family.