Results of a large new study tie frailty to low vitamin and antioxidant levels, suggesting a possible route to early intervention.
Frailty is associated with poor health, disability and death. It is common in adults over age 50 and especially in those over age 80. But the condition is reversible when caught early.
To study the impact of micronutrients on frailty, researchers from The Irish Longitudinal Study on Ageing observed the health of more than 4,000 adults aged 50 and older. Lower levels of lutein, zeaxanthin, and vitamins D and B were consistently associated with frailty and/or pre-frailty. In addition, study subjects with low levels of more than one micronutrient were more likely to have severe frailty.
“Frailty occurs when a number of systems in the body lose reserve capacity and therefore the ability to ‘bounce back’ after even trivial illnesses,” said Rose-Anne Kenny, Ph.D., the study’s principal investigator, in a statement. “This research suggests new potential treatments for a common and important condition.”
