The world’s population is rapidly ageing, with a concomitant increase in chronic diseases and functional decline. Understanding the metabolic associated alterations is therefore essential for better prevention and clinical decision-making. Frailty has emerged as a key age-related vulnerability syndrome, characterized by reduced physiological reserve and increased susceptibility to stressors, often clinically assessed through Fried’s physical phenotype. Its early stage, pre-frailty, more prevalent and reversible, offers a key window for early intervention to prevent disability, hospitalization and mortality.

Research increasingly highlights the central role of metabolic disturbances in ageing, particularly through pathways shaped by lifestyle and diet. Among them, metabolic syndrome (MetS) is a major age-related condition and a strong risk factor for adverse cardiometabolic outcomes. Its frequent coexistence with frailty in older adults, likely via shared mechanisms such as chronic inflammation, insulin resistance and oxidative stress, poses a serious challenge to healthy ageing. Yet, important gaps persist regarding how MetS and pre-frailty emerge together, interact over time and differ across individuals.

This webinar will present new insights from complementary epidemiological and metabolomic investigations designed to clarify these relationships. Through cross-sectional and longitudinal analyses, clustering approaches and independent metabolomic profiling, we will illuminate the co-occurrence and biological mechanisms connecting MetS and pre-frailty. Altogether, these findings open promising avenues for improved risk stratification and precision prevention in older adults.