Exploring sarcopenia as a predictive factor for the development of cognitive dysfunction

As the lifespan of our population increases, dementia has become more prevalent causing a dramatic deterioration in quality of life and is a significant burden to caregivers and our health care system. Unfortunately, currently available treatments are few and have inadequate efficacy. It would be most useful to be able to identify people at risk of developing dementia and be able to institute preventative measures. Therefore, it is critical to identify people at high risk of dementia. Decreased muscle mass has been proposed to be associated with dementia, but results of various studies have been conflicting. We propose to use the large size of the CLSA cohort to determine not only whether decreased muscle mass is associated with dementia, but whether it is associated with cognitive decline and future onset of dementia. If such a predictive relationship is identified, treatments that are now appearing for muscle wasting could be tested for their ability to prevent the onset of dementia.