Determination of the relationship between protein consumption and physical activity levels of patients with type 2 diabetes with sarcopenia

Introduction: Sarcopenia is characterized by a decrease in muscle strength and muscle mass and may cause serious deterioration in functional capacity. While sarcopenia seen with aging is classified as primary, sarcopenia developing due to other reasons is called secondary sarcopenia. Type 2 diabetes is one of the secondary reasons that can cause sarcopenia. Especially uncontrolled diabetes is thought to cause sarcopenia through pathogenetic mechanisms such as increased inflammatory cytokine release, malnutrition, physical inactivity, obesity, neuropathy and vascular complications. In this study, it was aimed to evaluate the relation of sarcopenia status with patients' nutritional properties, physical activity level, the quality of life,the complications of diabetes and glycemic control parameters by scanning sarcopenia in patients who were followed up with the diagnosis of type 2 diabetes. Material and method: A total of 249 patients with type 2 diabetes, including 174 women and 75 men that werefollowed in Diabetes Outpatient Clinic of İstanbul Faculity of Medicine, were included in the study. All patients were evaluated with the SARC-F scale for sarcopenia and anthropometric measurements, muscle strength measurements and muscle mass measurements were performed. The patients, whose biochemical parameters were obtained from the file records, were applied certain scales to evaluate the quality of life, the risk of fragility and malnutrition, the level of physical activity and the level of dependence in daily activities, and 24-hour food consumption record was taken from all of them. Finding: In the study, participants with a SARC-F scale score of ≥ 4 were evaluated as sarcopenic and 77 patients constituted the sarcopenic patient group. The rate of women, the avarageof age, the average of HbA1c value, and the frequency of complications of diabetes were significantly higher in the sarcopenic patient group than in patients without sarcopenia (p <0.05). While patients with sarcopenia spent much more their time on sitting, their physical activity levels, the quality of life, falling rate, daily energy and protein intake were inspected significantly lower (p <0.05). Results: In the study, uncontrolled prolonged diabetes, physical inactivity and unbalanced nutrition intake were identified as important risk factors for the development of sarcopenia. In diabetic patients, sarcopenia adversely affects the quality of life, the dependency and vulnerability of individuals in their daily activities, and the risk of falling. Patients with developed complication of diabetes are more likely to experience sarcopenia. The SARC-F scale can be used as an effective method to identify patients at high risk of sarcopenia. Key Words: type2 diabetes, sarcopenia, fragility, the quality of life, physical activity, malnutrition, total energy intake, protein amount, protein ratio