Frailty described as a probable problematic expression of population ageing yet it isn't isn’t done as part of standard medical care

By Gazette Staff

February 2nd, 2026

BURLINGTON, ON

Frailty has been described as one of the most problematic expressions of population ageing. However, frailty screening isn’t done as part of standard medical care.

A new made-in-Hamilton app is helping health-care providers identify the risk of frailty and age-related loss of muscle mass and strength in less than 15 minutes. The Fit-Frailty App – developed at the Geras Centre for Aging Research, a Hamilton Health Sciences (HHS) research centre funded by HHS and affiliated with McMaster University – is the only comprehensive frailty assessment app of its kind.

The Geras team worked with the HHS Centre for Data Science and Digital Health (CREATE) team who works with hospital clinicians to develop new ideas and create digital solutions that fundamentally reimagine how health care is delivered.

Dr. Courtney Kennedy, a Hamilton Health Sciences and McMaster researcher and an occupational therapist.

“The Fit-Frailty app is a more holistic measure as it looks at several different aspects that contribute to a patient’s frailty level including physical, cognitive and mental health,” says Dr. Courtney Kennedy, a Hamilton Health Sciences and McMaster researcher and an occupational therapist who led the development of the Fit-Frailty app. “Understanding not only how frail someone is but also identifying areas where intervention is needed can help doctors and other clinicians better assess a patient’s level of frailty and develop individualized care plans.”

Currently, the app has been piloted in clinical practice at Hamilton Health Sciences and with the McMaster Division of Rheumatology led by Dr. Arthur Lau and Dr. Jonathan (Rick) Adachi. It is also being used in three large CIHR-funded clinical trials led by GERAS and the McMaster Division of Rheumatology.

There have been approximately 500 research participants thus far and the team plans to provide further launch and knowledge translation in the future.

The study testing the Fit-Frailty App has recently been published in the British Medical Journal (BMJ) at https://bmjopen.bmj.com/content/15/12/e098892.full.

“We were able to demonstrate that slow-paced rehabilitation at Hamilton Health Sciences is an effective program for reducing frailty and improving function,” says Kennedy. “One of the most novel elements of this App is that we were able to show that it could be used to measure intervention change for pre- and post-rehabilitation.”