Preliminary evaluation of the prevalence of sarcopenia in obese patients from Southern Italy

Objectives: Sarcopenic obesity has not yet been widely defined. The aim of this study was to evaluate the prevalence of sarcopenia in a group of severely obese adults from southern Italy by using two different indexes: percentage of skeletal muscle mass (SMP) and skeletal muscle mass normalized for height (SMI); and to determine SMP and SMI cutoff points in a southern Italy reference population. Methods: Skeletal muscle mass of 131 consecutive obese adult outpatients (51 men and 80 women; ages 45-67y; body mass index 44.6±7.7kg/m²), was assessed by bioimpedance analysis. SMP and SMI cutoff points to identify moderate and severe sarcopenia were calculated in a reference group of 500 young southern Italy adults (100 men and 400 women; ages 18-40y; body mass index 25.2±5.6kg/m²) and applied to assess the prevalence of sarcopenia in the study population. Results: SMP cutoff points to identify moderate and severe sarcopenia were, 28.8% to 35.6% and ≤28.7% in men and 23.1% to 28.4% and ≤23% in women, respectively. The corresponding values for SMI were 8.44 to 9.53kg/m² and ≤8.43kg/m² in men, 6.49 to 7.32kg/m² and ≤6.48kg/m² in women. According to SMP, 23 of 51 (45.1%) men and 19 of 80 (23.8%) women were moderately sarcopenic; 28 of 51 (54.9%) men and 61 of 80 (76.3%) women met the definition of severe sarcopenia. Based on SMI, only 2 of 51 (3.9%) men were moderately sarcopenic. Conclusions: This study confirms that sarcopenia rates vary widely in obese patients depending on the criteria used. SMP as a screening tool to identify a sarcopenia at-risk population.