Frailty and brain health should be taken into account when determining whether patients should have a defibrillator implanted in their chest, suggests a new study.
More than 20 percent of patients with frailty or dementia died within a year of getting defibrillators, which means they likely didn’t benefit from the devices, researchers found.
“If someone has a 20 percent risk of dying in one year, we’re not sure if they’ll benefit from a defibrillator,” said lead author Dr. Ariel Green, of Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore.
