Body composition changes in male patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease: Aging or disease process?

Li Wen Lee, Chieh Mo Lin, Hung Chou Li, Pei Lin Hsiao, An Chi Chung, Chu Jung Hsieh, Pi Chi Wu, Shu Feng Hsu*

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalJournal Article peer-review

16 Scopus citations

Abstract

Background Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) mainly affects middle-age and elderly adults. It is unclear if the presence of muscle wasting and fat accumulation in patients with COPD is age or disease-related. This study investigated the effect of age and COPD disease severity on body composition with the aim of identifying a biomarker(s) for COPD. Methods Healthy subjects and patients with COPD of different severity were recruited. Dual-energy X-ray absorptiometry was used to analyze total and segmental body composition. Subjects included in the analysis were classified into four groups: healthy young (aged 20–45 years) (n = 35), healthy old (aged 60 years) (n = 37), moderate COPD (n = 40), and severe COPD (n = 14). Results In healthy old adults, leg and limb lean masses were lower by 10.6% and 8.5%, respectively, compared with healthy young adults (P < 0.05). Appendicular lean outcomes were significantly lower in the moderate COPD compared to the healthy old group and were significant lower in subjects with severe COPD compared to those with moderate COPD. All fat depots were similar for both young and old healthy subjects and subjects with moderate COPD, but significantly decreased in patients with severe COPD. Conclusions This study examined the changes in total and segmental body composition with aging and COPD severity. It found that aging and COPD altered the body composition differently, and the effect was most pronounced in leg lean mass. Remarkably, differences in appendicular lean masses were seen in mild COPD although no changes in body weight or BMI were apparent compared with healthy young adults. In contrast, fat depot changes were only observed in severe COPD. Aging and COPD processes are multifactorial and additional longitudinal studies are required to explore both the quantitative and qualitative changes in body composition with aging and disease process.

Original languageEnglish
Article numbere0180928
JournalPLoS ONE
Volume12
Issue number7
DOIs
StatePublished - 07 2017

Bibliographical note

Publisher Copyright:
© 2017 Lee et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

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