Changes in Muscle Mass in Patients With Renal Transplants Based on Ultrasound

Abstract

Objectives-This original research aimed to investigate the value of ultrasound (US), including grayscale US and shear wave elastography (SWE), in quantitatively evaluating muscle mass after kidney transplantation.Methods-A total of 52 patients and 54 healthy control participants were recruited. High-frequency US was used to evaluate the echo intensity and muscle morphologic features. Muscle stiffness in the rectus femoris was assessed with SWE. Interclass and intraclass correlation coefficients were used for evaluating measurement reliability. The diagnostic performance of SWE was determined by a receiver operating characteristic curve analysis.Results-The intraobserver and interobserver repeatability was excellent (all correlation coefficients >0.940; P < .05). The best evaluation point after right iliac fossa transplantation was at the lower third of the right leg. In patients, the skin (0.154 versus 0.192 cm) and rectus femoris (0.700 versus 0.905 cm) were thinner, and the pinnate angle (6.500 versus 8.000 ) and area (0.965 versus 1.270 cm 2 ) were smaller (all P < .05). The US results showed that, compared with the controls, all patients' rectus femoris echo intensity (P < .001 in the transverse section) and elastic modulus (P < .001 in the Young modulus and shear wave speed) increased significantly. The cutoff values were 10.05 and 10.37, and the areas under the receiver operating characteristic curves were 0.843 and 0.845 for predicting kidney transplant and sarcopenia, respectively.Conclusions-This noninvasive and convenient technique might be effective for objectively evaluating the muscle mass of patients after kidney transplantation.

Diagnosis, prevalence, and outcomes of sarcopenia in kidney transplantation recipients: A systematic review and meta‐analysis

“…Out of these, 20 studies were excluded for reasons detailed in Table S2 . Finally, 23 6 , 7 , 8 , 29 , 30 , 31 , 32 , 33 , 34 , 35 , 36 , 37 , 38 , 39 , 40 , 41 , 42 , 43 , 44 , 45 , 46 , 47 , 48 studies were included, involving 2535 KTRs with 59.7% of male subjects. Of these, nine studies were from Europe, seven were from Asia, five were from South America, one was from North America, and one was from Oceania.…”

“…The diagnostic criteria used to assess sarcopenia are summarized in Table 1 . Ten studies 6 , 8 , 29 , 30 , 31 , 34 , 35 , 36 , 37 , 48 used low muscle mass (LMM) as the sole diagnostic criterion, whereas 13 studies 7 , 32 , 33 , 38 , 39 , 40 , 41 , 42 , 43 , 44 , 45 , 46 , 47 used LMM in combination with low muscle strength (LMS) and/or low physical performance (LPP). The different cut‐off thresholds used to define sarcopenia for each of the included studies are listed in Table 2 .…”

“…49 , 50 , 51 , 52 , 53 , 54 , 55 , 56 , 57 LMM was measured via dual‐energy X‐ray absorptiometry (six studies), 7 , 31 , 34 , 39 , 42 , 45 bioelectrical impedance analysis (10 studies), 8 , 32 , 33 , 38 , 40 , 41 , 43 , 44 , 46 , 47 and computed tomography (CT, six studies). 6 , 29 , 30 , 35 , 36 , 37 LMS was measured by HGS (14 studies). 7 , 33 , 38 , 39 , 40 , 41 , 42 , 43 , 44 , 45 , 46 , 47 , 48 LPP was measured by GS, including 4mGS (four studies), 33 , 40 , 42 , 43 6mGS (two studies), 32 , 39 and 10mGS (two studies).…”

Ultrasonic Elastography of the Rectus Femoris, a Potential Tool to Predict Sarcopenia in Patients With Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease

“…Grayscale ultrasound has been used for diagnosing age-related sarcopenia by measuring muscle geometric proportions ( Narici et al, 2021 ). In addition, Chen et al (2021) reported that SWE could be used for the diagnosis of sarcopenia in patients who have had renal transplants. However, the potential value of grayscale ultrasound and SWE in the diagnosis of sarcopenia in patients with COPD is unclear.…”

Quantitative Evaluation of Real-Time Shear-Wave Elastography under Deep Learning in Children with Chronic Kidney Disease

“…e examination of the kidney by the SWE technology is affected by many factors, such as the child's breath-holding degree and physical fitness, the experience level of the operator, and the scanning technology. ese factors will affect the accuracy of the measured value, but there is no unified standard operating method [23].…”