The relationship of physical activity (PA) and walking with sarcopenia in Korean males aged 60 years and older using the Fourth Korean National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (KNHANES IV-2, 3), 2008–2009

Although a variety of studies have reported the association between age related changes in muscle mass and the functional impairments of the elderly, few have reported on the modifiable lifestyle factors that are related to sarcopenia. Three thousand five hundred ninety-eight men in nationally representative cross-sectional, population-representative sampled survey using data from the KNHANES IV aged 19 years and older who completed a body composition using a dual energy X-ray absorptiometry (DXA) were measured. To determine whether there are any associations between physical activities, nutritional status and sarcopenia were examined in 1156 men among those over 60 years of age. Appendicular skeletal muscle mass (ASM) was calculated as the sum of skeletal muscle in the arms and legs. Sarcopenia was defined as the ASM/Ht2 of less than two standard deviations (SD) below the sex-specific normal mean for the younger reference group. The prevalence of sarcopenia in Korean men aged 60 years and older was 9.9%. Sarcopenia was negatively associated with the third quartile (OR = 0.40, 95% CI = 0.20–0.80) and fourth quartile of PA (OR = 0.24, 95% CI = 0.11–0.52), and negatively associated with the highest quartile of protein intake (OR = 0.32, 95% CI = 0.14–0.76). In logistic regression models, sarcopenia was negatively associated with walking PA (OR = 0.49, 95% CI = 0.29–0.83) after an adjustment for age, smoking habits, alcohol drinking, family income, education status and protein intake.Sarcopenia was associated with PA, especially walking PA.