Ultrasonographic intra-inter-variability on patients with Sarcopenia and autoimmune diseases

Abstract

Introduction. Sarcopenia is a muscle disease, which affect the muscle mass, strength and the physical performance at the older patients. Ultrasound is a new research and accurate technique for measure the muscle mass and quantity. The use of ultrasound was recently approved for diagnosis of sarcopenia. Aim of the study. The aim of this study is to evaluate intra and inter-variability for ultrasonographic measured areas of biceps brachii (BB), rectus femoris (RF) and the diaphragm (DF) end- expiratory and maximum-inspiratory. Materials and methods. The study included 17 patients with autoimmune disease of rheumatology department of County Hospital of Targu Mures, Romania. They were ultrasonographic evaluated for a 5-day period (day 1 and day 5) on the biceps brachii, rectus femoris and diaphragm DF (end- expiratory and maximum inspiratory) muscle to identify the intra- inter-variability between the two operators. The study is a prospective, pure observational, non-interventional and the statistical analysis was perform with Microsoft Office Excel package, GraphPad Prism 6 and SPSS. Intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC) was considered statistically significant if ICC>0,7. Results. ICC proves good inter-observer variability (P&W2009) at the following levels: BB right assessment 1 and 2 (0,755/0,847 p<0,0001), BB left assessment 1 and 2 (0,8/0,818 p<0,0001), RF right assessment 1 and 2 (0,858/0,927 p<0,0001), RF left assessment 1 and 2 (0,89/0,77 p<0,0001). Poor results were found on the diaphragm investigation: DF endexpiratory evaluation 1 and 2 (0,42/0,65 p<0,0001), DF maximum inspiratory evaluation 1 and 2 (0,32/0,608 p<0,0001). Regarding the intra-reliability we obtain good statistically significant results on the level of BB right 0,86, RF right 0,78 and RF left 0,78. Conclusions. In conclusion biceps brachii and rectus femoris ultrasound showed a good interintra variability and the results revealed a ultrasonographic skill improvement from day 1 to day 5.