Development of a Physiological Frailty Index for the World Trade Center General Responder Cohort

Responders to the 9/11/2001 WTC attacks were exposed to multiple toxic pollutants. Since 2002, the health of the responder cohort has been continuously tracked by the WTC Health Monitoring Program. However, no assessments have been made of frailty, an important health metric given the current average age of the WTC responder cohort (55 years). In this study, we use laboratory test results and other physiological parameters to construct a physiological frailty index (FI-Lab) for this cohort. The study sample comprised responders aged 40 years or older who completed a health monitoring visit at Mount Sinai Center within the past 5 years. For each subject, FI-Lab was computed as the proportion of 20 physiological parameters (lab tests, pulmonary function, and blood pressure) on which the subject had abnormal values. Using negative binomial regression models, we tested FI-Lab’s association with the SF-12 wellbeing score and various demographic characteristics. FI-Lab showed strong associations with the physical and mental components of the SF-12 as well as age, race, and smoking status. Using a cutoff of 0.25 to define presence of physiological/preclinical frailty, we found frailty prevalence in the study sample to be approximately 12%. This study demonstrates the feasibility of assessing preclinical frailty in the WTC responder cohort.