The Hospital Frailty Risk Score and outcomes in head and neck cancer surgery.

OBJECTIVE: This study aimed to assess if the Hospital Frailty Risk Score (HFRS) could predict outcomes for older people undergoing head and neck procedures.

DESIGN: A retrospective cohort study of patients admitted between April 2008 and February 2020, undergoing head and neck procedures defined as major resections using procedural codes.

SETTING: The analysis was performed using data from the NHS Secondary Uses Service (SUS) electronic database.

PARTICIPANTS: A number of 7479 patients were selected based on an age of 75 years and above and an admission associated with a diagnostic code associated with a head and neck cancer. Based on HFRS, 5153 patients were risk-stratified into mild, moderate, and severe frailty risk.

MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: The relationships between frailty risk and length of stay, readmission rate, and mortality were quantified using descriptive statistics.

RESULTS: Severely frail patients had a median length of stay of 9 days compared to 3 for mildly frail patients. Twenty-seven percentage of severely frail patients were readmitted within 30 days of surgery. Rising levels of frailty correlate with a higher risk of death following surgery which is maintained in longer term mortality at 1 year and until the data were extracted in March 2022. Fifty percentage of moderately frail patients and 66% of severely frail patients had died in hospital by the end of the study period.

CONCLUSION: The results quantify the relationship between frailty and adverse health outcomes. This information could be used to identify those that might benefit from holistic assessment, aid prognostication, commissioning, and service planning.