Sarcopenia in Acute Care Patients: Protocol for the European Collaboration of Geriatric Surveys: Sarcopenia 9+EAMA Project
Abstract
Sarcopenia is a disease characterized by a progressive loss of skeletal muscle mass and strength and is related to physical impairment, disability, worse clinical outcomes, and mortality in all health care settings.1 An important fact is that it is also reversible, with tailored exercise and nutritional support.1,2 Sarcopenia prevalence varies widely depending on the criteria, measurement methods, and cut-off points used for its assessment1,2; to date, few studies addressed the issue of sarcopenia in hospitalized older patients, rendering it an under-recognized clinical entity.3-5 In 2015, the European Geriatric Medicine Society (EuGMS) founded the Special Interest Group on Sarcopenia, which aims to bridge the gaps between clinical practice and research ("Action-Research Philosophy") by promoting collaborations between international scientific societies and institutions, and launching, in 2018, the revised European consensus on the definition and diagnosis on sarcopenia (EWGSOP2).1 We aim to prospectively evaluate the prevalence and incidence of sarcopenia (as defined by the EWGSOP2 criteria) in hospitalized patients across Europe (Belgium, Denmark, Germany, Italy, the Czech Republic, Poland, Portugal, Spain, and the United Kingdom) to assess risk factors associated with its presence or incidence and to assess sarcopenia-related adverse clinical outcomes.