Stem cells application in frailty

Frailty can be defined as a systematic physiological decline that typically occurs in the nervous, muscular, metabolic, and immune systems of the older people. A multitude of risk factors have been identified to contribute to cause or exacerbate frailty, these risk factors lead to a heightened complexity and difficulty in preventing and treating frailty, which seriously threatens the health and well-being of the elderly people. Because of the unique characteristic of stem cells, including being a convenient source, low immunogenicity, and multi-directional differentiation potential, considerable advancements have been made in the field of frailty research. In this review, we summarized the impacts of the main risk factors, including genetic factors, ageing, sex differences, polypharmacy, malnutrition and unhealthy lifestyles in the onset and progression of frailty, provided an overview of the recent research progress in preclinical and clinical applications of stem cells in frailty, and discussed application limitations of stem cells in frailty and proposed the possible solutions. It was concluded that stem cells represent an ideal potential treatment method for frailty, offering significant advantages in terms of convenience, immunogenicity, and pluripotency.