Evaluation of sarcopenia and phase angle in elderly patients with Parkinson's Disease

To investigate sarcopenia and related factors and to determine the disease-specific phase angle (PhA) cut-off score in detecting sarcopenia in elderly patients with Parkinson's Disease (PD).

This cross-sectional study was conducted with 89 participants. The Mini-Nutritional Assessment (MNA), the Eating Attitude Test-10 (EAT-10), the Physical Activity Scale for The Elderly (PASE) questionnaire and the Hoehn-Yahr scale have been used. Additionally, anthropometric measurements were performed. The diagnosis of sarcopenia was based on the new consensus published by the European Working Group on Sarcopenia in Older People 2 (EWGSOP2). PhA has been performed by Bioelectrical Impedance Analysis (BIA) with Tanita MC 780®.

The mean age was of the participants 68.9 ± 6.4 years, and 57.3% were male. The prevalence of sarcopenia was 12.3%. PhA, malnutrition, age, disease severity, low calf circumference (CC), low body mass index (BMI), the difference between the pre-diagnosis and current weight loss, dopaminergic treatment, and low PASE score were associated with sarcopenia. The cut-off value of the PhA in terms of the ability to identify sarcopenia was <4.5o with a sensitivity of 53.3% and a specificity of 93.2% (p = 0.001). When we grouped the PhA of the patients according to this cut-off score, it was seen that 14.6% of them were sarcopenic. Age, disease severity, PASE score and hand grip strength were significantly related to both sarcopenia and PhA.

It is important to be aware of sarcopenia and related factors at an early stage in Parkinson's patients. Because of disease-related symptoms, it may be more appropriate to use a disease-specific PhA cut-off score in the definition of sarcopenia.