Exercise Intervention for Anti-Sarcopenia in Community-Dwelling Older People

Abstract

Sarcopenia is an age-related health problem in general communities. Effective exercise programs against sarcopenia remain necessary for community-dwelling older people. In order to summarize the available knowledge on this subject, we collected English articles from a MED-LINE/Pubmed database examining the effects of exercise interventions on sarcopenia-related outcome measures in community-dwelling older people. When nine articles, including eight randomized controlled trials, were reviewed, most studies demonstrated significant improvements in some outcome measures. Indeed, a significant improvement in the muscle mass in one study, muscle strength in two studies and physical performance in two studies was reported among five studies using exercise (E) alone. A significant improvement in the muscle mass in two studies, muscle strength in one study and physical performance in two studies was also reported among four studies using exercise plus nutritional supplementation (EN). Notably, the EN studies appeared to have less extensive exercise interventions than the E studies. One EN study further exhibited significant improvements in all outcome measures. Collectively, exercise could be used as anti-sarcopenic strategies and nutritional interventions when combined with exercise might play a compensated or perhaps a comprehensive role among communitydwelling older people. Limited studies exist and more studies are required for the optimum programs in the community settings.

Risk factors associated with low handgrip strength in the older Korean population

“…Low participation rates in aerobic and strengthening exercise were significantly associated with low HGS in both genders. Exercise has been emphasized as a key strategy for sarcopenia treatment, along with nutritional supplementation [26, 27], and our findings support the importance of exercise for the elderly in Korea. Although there was a difference in the exercise participation rates between the low and normal HGS groups, an interesting observation was that the participation rate was low in both the low and normal HGS groups.…”

“…Due to the cross-sectional nature of this study, it is not possible to explain the causal relationship between exercise and HGS; thus, further studies are needed. In Japan, several studies on community-based exercise programs have been conducted, including the aging population [27], and high adherence to exercise intervention was observed [30, 31]. It could be helpful to develop appropriate community-based exercise programs for the elderly in Korea.…”

A scoping review of physical activity interventions for older adults

“…Consistent with recent literature [ 12 ], most of the reviews we identified relate to interventions of structured exercise [ 76 , 77 ], including strength, balance, and resistance training, and physical recreation [ 78 – 80 ] including yoga and tai chi. A number of structured exercise interventions included video or exergames [ 81 – 83 ] but no reviews targeted sport-based programmes for older adults and this should be investigated further.…”

Muscle Exercise Mitigates the Negative Influence of Low Socioeconomic Status on the Lack of Muscle Strength: A Cross-Sectional Study

“…A lack of exercise would have a negative influence on muscle strength. A study using KNHANES VI showed low muscle strength when no exercise was performed [26], while a study by Miyazaki et al showed similar results [17].…”