Using electronic consultation (eConsult) to identify frailty in provider-to-provider communication: a feasibility and validation study.

The availability of frailty-related terms establishes the feasibility of using provider-to-provider communication on eConsult to identify patients with high likelihood of living with this condition. The higher average of frailty-related terms in LTC (versus community) cases, and agreement between clinician-provided frailty ratings and the frequency of frailty-related terms, support the validity of an eConsult-based approach to identifying frailty. There is potential for eConsult to be used as a case-finding tool in primary care for early recognition and proactive initiation of care processes for older patients living with frailty.