Objective To investigate the association between chewing ability and frailty in elderly adults in communities of China.

Methods A total of 12, 678 elderly people in community were selected from data of Chinese Longitudinal Healthy Longevity and Happy Family Study(CLHLS-HF) as the study subjects. Multivariate Logistic regression analysis was used to explore the relationship between chewing ability and frailty of elderly people in community, and restricted cubic spline (RCS) based on Logistic regression analysis was used to analyze the dose-response relationship between the number of teeth and frailty risk in elderly people in community of China.

Results Of the 12, 678 community-dwelling older adults, the mean age was (83.62±11.16) years, with an age ranging from 65 to 117 years; there were 5, 848 (46.1%) men and 6, 830 (53.9%) women. The Results of the multifactorial Logistic regression analysis showed that after adjusting for the covariates including gender, age, marital status, place of residence, ethnicity, living arrangement, years of education, healthcare availability and occupation before age of 60, self-rated economic status, body mass index (BMI), smoking status, alcohol consumption status, exercise status, self-rating health status variables, and participation in the annual medical check-ups or not, the Results showed that the chewing ability of community-dwelling older adults was associated with the risk of frailty (P < 0.05). The RCS plot showed a linear correlation between the number of natural teeth and the risk of frailty, with the risk of frailty increasing when the number of natural teeth was less than 10, and the risk of frailty gradually increased as the number of teeth decreased.

Conclusion Chewing ability is associated with the risk of frailty in Chinese older adults, and the number of natural teeth and the use of dentures are important for the development of frailty in older adults.