The association of alcohol consumption with the risk of sarcopenia: a dose-response meta-analysis

ABSTRACT

Background: Sarcopenia is defined as a progressive loss of skeletal muscle mass plus a decline in muscle strength and/or reduced physical performance with advancing age. The results of current studies on the relationship between drinking and sarcopenia remain controversial.

Objectives: The aim of this meta-analysis was to evaluate the association of alcohol consumption with the risk of sarcopenia.

Methods: Systematic searches were conducted without language restrictions from the beginning of each database to September 20, 2023 on PubMed, Embase, Cochrane Library, Web of Science, Wanfang Data, Chinese BioMedical Literature, and China national knowledge infrastructure databases. Meta-analysis was conducted to pool the study-specific odds ratios (ORs) with 95% confidence interval (CI).

Results: Sixty-two studies with 454,643 participants were enrolled. The meta-analysis of proportions revealed that alcohol consumption was not associated with the presence of sarcopenia, with a pooled OR of 0.964 (95% CI = 0.912–1.019). Further subgroup analysis indicated that alcohol consumption was correlated with lower risk of sarcopenia in men (OR = 0.763; 95% CI = 0.622–0.938; P = .010). The nonlinear dose-response analysis suggested a J-shaped association between alcohol consumption and the risk of sarcopenia, with a nadir at the amounts of alcohol consumption of 6.6 grams/day (OR = 0.765; 95% CI = 0.608–0.957; P < .05).

Conclusions: The results of this meta-analysis indicate that alcohol consumption is not a risk factor for the development of sarcopenia. Any suggestion of a putative protective effect of alcohol should be treated with caution, particularly in light of the overall lack of relationship reported in the present comprehensive meta-analysis.

KEYWORDS:

• Alcohol consumption
• dose-response
• sarcopenia
• meta-analysis

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by grants from the National Key Research and Development Plan of China [No. 2020YFC2008505 to Xiang Lu], the National Natural Science Foundation of China [No. 81970218 to Xiang Lu and 81970217 to Wei Gao], and the Jiangsu Commission of Health [No. LR2022004 and LKZ2023005 to Wei Gao].