AUTHOR=Valent Dora , Peball Marina , Krismer Florian , Lanbach Anna , Zemann Sophie , Horlings Corinne , Poewe Werner , Seppi Klaus 

TITLE=Different assessment tools to detect sarcopenia in patients with Parkinson's disease

JOURNAL=Frontiers in Neurology

VOLUME=Volume 13 - 2022

YEAR=2022

URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/neurology/articles/10.3389/fneur.2022.1014102

DOI=10.3389/fneur.2022.1014102

ISSN=1664-2295

ABSTRACT=Introduction: Sarcopenia and Parkinson’s disease are closely related diseases of the elderly population leading to progressive disability and nursing-dependent care. 
Objective: The aim of this study was to estimate the prevalence of sarcopenia in PD patients with three different approaches: (1) the screening tool SARC-F, (2) EWGSOP-1 criteria, and (3) EWGSOP -2 criteria. Moreover, we aimed to evaluate the diagnostic accuracy of the screening tool SARC-F to detect sarcopenia according to the updated EWGSOP-2 Criteria. 
Methods: 81 patients with Parkinson’s disease aged 65 years and above were interviewed in a cross-sectional study at a tertiary referral center. All patients were screened with the SARC-F questionnaire and were evaluated for motor and non-motor symptoms, exercise, quality of life and frailty. Muscle mass was assessed with bioelectrical impedance analysis, handgrip strength with a dynamometer and gait speed was assessed with the 8 m walk test. EWGSOP-2 criteria were considered the gold standard to diagnose sarcopenia in our study. 
Results: 81 patients were evaluated (mean age: 73.82; SD 5.30). The prevalence of sarcopenia was 28.4% according to the EWGSOP- 2 criteria. The concordance between EWGSOP-2 and EWGSOP-1 was poor (weighted kappa of 0.361[95% 0.164-0.557]). Sensitivity of the SARC-F screening test for detecting sarcopenia was 60.9%. The corresponding AUC in the ROC Curve analysis showed 0.598 (0.462, 0.734 CI). The item assessing strength was found to have the highest sensitivity (69.6%).
Conclusion: Sarcopenia prevalence in PD patients in Tirol, Austria is higher with EWGSOP-1 compared to EWGSOP-2 criteria. The sensitivity and specificity of the SARC-F scale to detect sarcopenia in this population is poor.