Meta-analysis of the Prevalence of Oral Frailty in the Elderly

Background Population aging has heightened, raising concerns about elderly health. Oral frailty, a novel frailty phenotype in the elderly, directly impacts the quality of life. A thorough grasp of oral frailty's prevalence in the elderly is crucial for formulating effective preventive and interventional strategies. Objective To systematically evaluate the prevalence of oral frailty in the elderly. Methods The CNKI, Wanfang Data, VIP, CBM, PubMed, Web of Science, Embase, CINAHL and Cochrane Library databases were searched for literature related to the study purpose with a time limit of the construction of the database to 19 April 2024. Literature was independently screened, information extracted and quality assessed by 2 researchers, and meta-analysis was performed using Stata 14.0 software. Results A total of 19 cross-sectional studies were included, with a total sample size of 11 776 cases and a risk of bias quality score of 6-9, all of which were of moderate or high quality. Meta-analysis showed that the prevalence of oral frailty in elderly people was 29.5% (95%CI=24.1%-35.2%), and the prevalence of pre-oral frailty was 47.9% (95%CI=40.5%-55.4%). Subgroup analyses showed that the progressive increase in the prevalence of oral frailty in the elderly with advancing age. Higher prevalence rates of oral frailty were observed in individuals screened using the Oral Frailty Index-8 (P<0.05) . Conclusion The prevalence of oral frailty is high in the elderly, and attention should be focused on the oral health status of the elderly in China, with the selection of appropriate screening and assessment tools and early interventions.