Relationship between body composition and lung function in elderly men and women.

INTRODUCTION: The purpose of this study was to evaluate the relationship between body composition parameters and lung functions including vital capacity (VC), forced vital capacity (FVC), forced expiratory volume in 1 second (FEV(1)), FEV(1):VC ratio, and FEV(1):FVC ratio in elderly men and women.

METHODS: The study was a cross-sectional evaluation of 99 healthy men and women (aged 60-88 years). Anthropometric and body composition parameters (including fat mass [FM], fat-free mass [FFM] and percentage body fat [%BF]) were evaluated using the skinfold method, and lung function was examined using spirometry.

RESULTS: Data analysis showed %BF, body FM and body mass index (BMI) of women to be significantly higher than men. Also, their body FFM was significantly less than men (P<0.05). Lung volume (P<0.01) and lung capacity values (P<0.05) (VC, FVC, FEV(1), FEV(1):VC, FEV(1):FVC) of women were significantly less than men. There was a positive significant relationship between the FFM versus FVC and FEV(1) values of women and men. A negative significant relationship was demonstrated between body FM, BMI and FVC of all subjects.

CONCLUSION: This investigation showed that women aged between 60 and 88 years had a lower lung capacity compared to men of the same age. Older women were found to have a higher body fat ratio than men, and it was found that increasing %BF and BMI had a negative effect on lung functions in both sexes.