Validation of a frailty index in patients undergoing curative surgery for urologic malignancy and comparison with other risk stratification tools

Existing risk stratification tools may be improved by incorporating variables in our 15-point modified frailty index as well as other factors such as walking speed, exhaustion, and sarcopenia to fully assess frailty. This is relevant in diseases such as kidney and prostate cancer, where surveillance and other nonsurgical interventions exist as alternatives to a potentially complicated surgery. In these scenarios, our modified frailty index augmented by the American Society of Anesthesiologists Risk Class may help inform which patients have increased surgical complications that may outweigh the benefit of surgery although this index needs prospective validation.