The Prevalence of Sarcopenic Obesity in Postmenopausal Women with a History of Breast Cancer Depending on Adopted Methodology – A Case–Control Study

Abstract

Introduction

Sarcopenic obesity (SO) is characterized as the cooccurrence of sarcopenia and obesity. It is associated with many adverse health consequences, also in oncological patients. The study aimed to assess the prevalence of SO in postmenopausal women with a history of breast cancer depending on adopted methodology.

Materials and Methods

The case–control study enrolled 103 women over the age of 50 with a history of breast cancer, including women who completed oncological treatment and had remained in remission for at least 5 years (group I, n=78) and women in whom the disease recurred (group II, n=25). The control group included women with no history of breast cancer (group III, n=73).

Results

In group II sarcopenia occurred significantly more commonly compared to both group I and the control group (for the skeletal muscle index (SMI) ≤29.20%: 13 (52%) in group II vs 16 (20.5%) in group I, p=0.004 and 3 (4.1%) in group III, p<0.001; for SMI ≤26.60%: 10 (40%) in group II vs 9 (11.5%) in group I, p=0.003 and 3 (4.1%) in group III, p<0.001; for SMI ≤33.87%: 17 (68%) in group II vs 21 (26.9%) in group I, p<0.001 and 5 (6.8%) in group III, p<0.001). Depending on the assessment criteria, SO was diagnosed in 0–11.5% of cases in group I, 0–40% of cases in group II and 0–4.1% in the control group. Intergroup differences were not statistically significant, irrespective of the adopted pair of diagnostic criteria. The highest detectability of SO was observed when SMI was combined with each of the diagnostic criteria for obesity used.

Discussion

SO diagnosis based on the percentage of fatty tissue mass in the body of >38% and SMI value were associated with a higher detection rate of SO in each study group, regardless of the adopted cut-off value. Similar results were obtained in each analyzed group when using the remaining diagnostic criteria for obesity and SMI value, regardless of the cut-off value.

Keywords:

• sarcopenia
• obesity
• breast neoplasms
• muscles
• menopause
• aging

Acknowledgments

This research did not receive any specific grant from funding agencies in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors. The study was accepted by the Bioethics Committee at the Medical University of Warsaw (no KB60/2012). All subjects were asked for their approval before starting the interview and a consent form was explained and then signed by all subjects. This study was conducted in accordance with the Declaration of Helsinki. The manuscript has not been published previously, it is not under consideration for publication elsewhere, its publication is approved by all authors and tacitly or explicitly by the responsible authorities where the work was carried out. If accepted, it will not be published elsewhere in the same form, in English or in any other language, including electronically without the written consent of the copyright holder.

Disclosure

The authors report no conflicts of interest in this work.