Frailty: An overlooked red flag in sports surgery

Abstract

Frailty can be defined as a decline in physiological and biological reserves that does not correlate directly with chronological age. While the general understanding of what geriatricians and orthopaedic surgeons should know about frailty has been increasingly discussed in recent years, the specific knowledge required by sports and shoulder surgeons remains underexplored. This paper aims to highlight what a sports and shoulder surgeon should know about frailty. With advances in healthcare technologies, both life expectancy and healthy life expectancy have significantly increased. A growing proportion of older adults are engaging in sports activities, and sports-related injuries in this population are becoming more common. In this context, frailty scales can be utilised to assess preoperative patient condition, anticipate intraoperative challenges, and predict postoperative complications, morbidity, and mortality risk. These tools can guide sports surgeons in understanding a patient ' s functional capacity and physiological resilience independently of chronological age.