Sarcopenia in patients with chronic heart failure

Abstract

Introduction: Chronic Heart Failure (CHF) induces a catabolic state that can generate sarcopenia, which is prevalent in 55,0 % of hospitalized patients. Objective: determine the frequency of risk of sarcopenia (RS) and probable sarcopenia (PS) in patients with CHF upon hospital admission and the agreement between both tools. Likewise, describe its relationship with characteristics of the population. Methods: observational and analytical study in patients over 18 years of age with CHF hospitalized from November 2022 to June 2023. SR variables were analyzed according to the SARC-F and SP tool using manual dynamometry. The Fisher and Mann-Whitney U tests analyzed the association between variables. The Kappa test evaluated the concordance between the tools, while sensitivity and specificity measured the predictive capacity. Results: 81.00% (95% CI 73.31-88.69) presented RS and 85.00% (95% CI 81.63-94.37) SP. The RS was associated with the presence of hospitalization (p= 0.014) and number of hospitalizations (p= 0.016). Anorexia was associated with the results of both tools (p= 0.004; p= 0.01). Nutritional status was related to SP (p= 0.049). Moderate agreement of 84.00% was found between SARC-F and manual dynamometry (Kappa= 0.4346, p < 0.001). The SARC-F showed fair predictive capacity. Conclusions: most of the sample presented a risk and probability of sarcopenia, with moderate concordance between the tools.