Frailty predicts severe postoperative complications after elective colorectal surgery

We aim to clarify if frailty affects severe postoperative complications in elective colorectal surgery. Consecutive 269 colorectal cancer patients older than 65 years undergoing curative surgery were enrolled in this study. The relevance of the frailty and sarcopenia to postoperative outcome was assessed. Clinical frailty (CF) was defined as clinical frailty scale (CFS) ≥ 4. Sarcopenia was assessed by measuring skeletal muscle area using computed tomography. Seventy-eight patients (29%) had CF and 159 patients (59%) had sarcopenia. CF was significantly associated with older age (P = 0.0008), postoperative severe complications (P = 0.001), and postoperative in-hospital stay (P