Accuracy of handgrip and respiratory muscle strength in identifying sarcopenia in older, community-dwelling, Brazilian women

Certain cut-off points for sarcopenia screening and diagnosis are arbitrary and based on European populations, with normative references often obtained from healthy young adults. Although respiratory skeletal muscle strength tests represent low-cost clinical measures commonly performed in clinical practice by health professionals, a gap remains regarding whether respiratory skeletal muscle strength tests are adequate and sensitive measures for sarcopenia screening. This study aimed to verify the value of handgrip and respiratory muscle strength as possible discriminators to identify sarcopenia and to establish cut-off points for sarcopenia screening in community-dwelling, Brazilian women. In a cross-sectional study, 154 community-dwelling, Brazilian women (65–96 years) were assessed for appendicular skeletal muscle mass, handgrip (HGS), and respiratory muscular strength, including maximal inspiratory pressure (MIP) and maximal expiratory pressure (MEP). The data were analyzed using the ROC curve and the Youden Index determined cut-off points. Statistical significance was set at 5%. 88 participants (57%) were sarcopenic. MEP (OR 0.98 [95%CI 0.97, 1.00], p = 0.023) and HGS (OR 0.82 [95% CI 0.75, 0.90], p < 0.001) were independent factors for sarcopenia in older. The optimal cut-off points for identifying sarcopenia were ≤ 77 cmH(2)O for MEP (AUC = 0.72), and ≤ 20 kg for HGS (AUC = 0.80). Simple muscular strength tests, including HGS and MEP, may be considered in the identification of sarcopenia in older, community-dwelling, Brazilian women. Future work is still needed to assess external validation of the proposed cut-offs before the clinical application.