Sarcopenia and associated factors in institutionalized elderly

Introduction: Sarcopenia is a condition related to the human aging process, it is characterized by muscle mass, strength and/or function loss. It is associated to several factors, it presents high prevalence among the institutionalized elderly. Objective: To verify the prevalence of sarcopenia and associated factors in institutionalized elderly. Materials and methods: Cross-sectional population-based study that evaluated 479 institutionalized elderly regarding sarcopenia (European Working Group on Sarcopenia Older People criteria), socioeconomic variables, comorbidities, anthropometric variables, cognitive status (Mini Mental State Examination), nutritional status (Mini Nutritional Assessment), fragility (Fried Phenotype) and functional capacity (Katz Scale). For statistical analysis were used descriptive statistics, association tests and crude and adjusted analysis by the Poisson Regression with robust variance. The level of significance was 5%. Results: The sample consisted of 225 elderly, 79.33 ± 9.40 years old, 65.8% female. The prevalence of sarcopenia was 44.4% (95.0% severe sarcopenia). Associated factors to sarcopenia were longevity, low body mass index, decreased calf circumference and poor nutritional status (p≤0.05). Conclusion: Sarcopenia is highly prevalent in institutionalized elderly, especially severe type, and is associated with longevity, decreased calf circumference and poor nutritional status (thinness and malnutrition).