Longer diabetes duration ups sarcopoenia risk in elderly adults

A longer duration of diabetes, or developing the disease during midlife, worsens the risk of sarcopoenia among elderly adults, a new Japan study has found.

The study included 824 elderly patients (aged 65–84 years) who had no sarcopoenia at baseline. Over the 2012–2017 follow-up, sarcopoenia incidence was determined according to the Asian Working Group for Sarcopoenia criteria.

Majority (n=552) of the participants did not have diabetes; the disease was diagnosed in midlife (<65 years) in 173 patients and later in life (≥65 years) in 99. Over the follow-up period, 47 participants (5.7 percent) developed sarcopoenia.

Logistic regression analysis revealed that those with diabetes were more than twice as likely to develop sarcopoenia than their nondiabetic comparators (odds ratio [OR], 2.51, 95 percent confidence interval [CI], 1.26–5.00; p=0.009). This analysis was adjusted for age, sex, body mass index, comorbidities, diet and lifestyle, and medical history.

When disaggregating according to the timing of diabetes, the researchers saw that being diagnosed in midlife was a strong risk factor for sarcopoenia, increasing its risk by more than three times (OR, 3.41, 95 percent CI, 1.55–7.48; p=0.002). Late-life diagnosis, on the other hand, had no significant impact on sarcopoenia risk (OR, 1.52, 95 percent CI, 0.55–4.19; p=0.42).

Moreover, the risk of sarcopoenia also increased with a longer diabetes duration (p_trend<0.01). Those who have had diabetes for >15 years were nearly five times as likely to develop sarcopoenia than nondiabetics (OR, 4.67; 95 percent CI, 1.77–12.28).

“Our results suggest the possibility that the decreasing duration of diabetes by prevention of diabetes in midlife reduces the risk of incident sarcopenia in later life in the general Japanese population,” the researchers said.