ArticleThe Journal of frailty & aging2026
The mediating role of chronic disease in socioeconomic inequalities in frailty: A longitudinal cohort study of older adults in Lausanne, Switzerland.
Article in The Journal of frailty & aging, 2026. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Not yet cited in PubMed.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
0 citing papers in PubMed.
No citing paper in PubMed yet.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
5 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
backgroundFrailty is a major public health concern in aging populations. Socioeconomic disadvantage increases the risk of frailty, yet the mechanisms underlying this association remain unclear.
objectivesTo examine the mediating role of chronic diseases in the longitudinal association between socioeconomic disadvantage and frailty.
designPopulation-based cohort study.
settingLausanne, Switzerland.
participants4731 community-dwelling adults aged 65-70 years at recruitment (2004, 2010, and 2014), followed for up to 16 years, as part of the Lausanne Cohort 65+.
interventionNone. MEASUREMENTS: Socioeconomic disadvantage was assessed using indicators of education, occupation, income, health insurance subsidy, and financial strain. Frailty was measured using the Fried phenotype (unintentional weight loss, exhaustion, low physical activity, weakness, and slow walking speed). Chronic conditions (obesity, diabetes, hypertension, cardiovascular and respiratory disease, and multimorbidity [≥2 conditions]) were assessed at baseline using standardized self-reported physician diagnoses. Counterfactual mediation using Cox proportional hazards models estimated the proportion of the socioeconomic disadvantage-frailty association mediated by each condition.
resultsSocioeconomic disadvantage was associated with a 1.5-2.5-fold higher risk of incident frailty. Obesity mediated 13-55% of this association, diabetes 11-22%, and multimorbidity 21-39%, whereas hypertension, cardiovascular, and respiratory disease showed minimal or no mediation.
conclusionsChronic diseases-particularly obesity and diabetes-partly explain the long-term impact of socioeconomic disadvantage on frailty, underscoring stark inequities in healthy aging. Early detection and management of these conditions in socioeconomically vulnerable older adults, alongside population-level prevention and efforts to address adverse socioeconomic conditions as root causes, could help reduce these inequalities.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What Socratic holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the Socratic graph.