Prevalence and Pathophysiology of Sarcopenia in the Elderly Patient With Hip Fracture. Prospective, Observational Study on Consecutive Series

Sarcopenia is the loss of muscle mass and function that accompanies aging. The term sarcopenia comes from the Greek "sarx" (flesh) and "penia" (loss). Sarcopenia is a topic of great interest to geriatricians, and from 2010 discussing the possibility of considering it as a geriatric syndrome. Diagnostic criteria are reduced muscle mass, reduced strength and impaired physical performance. The presence of muscle mass reduction set presarcopenia diagnosis, when combined with one of the other two are talking about sarcopenia and when are the three is defined as severe sarcopenia. The hypothesis of our study is that sarcopenia is highly prevalent in older people with hip fracture. The increase in inflammatory indices of older people, along with bed rest, represent factors that accelerate the development of sarcopenia. These factors together could be the base of the high percentage of patients who do not recover the degree of autonomy before the fracture.