Preinterventional Frailty Assessment in Patients Scheduled for Cardiac Surgery or Transcatheter Aortic Valve Implantation: A Consensus Statement of EACTS and EAPC

Preinterventional frailty assessment is gaining relevance in both cardiac surgery and transcatheter aortic valve implantation (TAVI). Nowadays, frailty assessment is an essential part of the heart team discussions when evaluating patients for cardiac surgery and transcatheter interventions. There is, however, a lack of consensus on how to assess frailty for the prediction of outcomes of cardiovascular operations or transcatheter interventions. Hence, the European Association for Cardio-Thoracic Surgery (EACTS) and the European Association of Preventive Cardiology (EAPC) reviewed the available literature and developed a consensus statement on preinterventional frailty assessment in patients scheduled for cardiac surgery or TAVI. The recommendations of the consensus statement are focused on surgical procedures and TAVI. However, based on the available literature on frailty assessment related to other transcatheter interventions, such as transcatheter edge-to-edge mitral valve repair and the similarity of these patients to TAVI cohorts, the authors propose to apply the recommendations in this consensus statement to patients undergoing other transcatheter interventions as well.