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Hormone
may help combat Frailty in Older Women
Newswise — Frail elderly women with unexplained weight loss
may benefit from supplementation with the
body’s appetite-stimulating hormone, ghrelin,
or with similar agents, according to a new
study.
Results of the study, which was funded partially by the
National Institutes of Health, were
presented at The Endocrine Society’s 91st
Annual Meeting in Washington, D.C.
Unexplained weight loss is a common problem in older
adults. It can lead to the development of
frailty, a debilitating syndrome of declines
across multiple body systems.
Frail individuals have much higher rates of functional
decline, hospitalization and death than
healthier people their age, said study lead
investigator Anne Cappola, MD, ScM,
assistant professor of medicine at the
University of Pennsylvania School of
Medicine, Philadelphia.
“There are no good medical treatments for frailty or
unintentional weight loss at this time,”
Cappola said.
The pilot study enrolled five women age 70 or older who had
unintentional, unexplained weight loss of
greater than 5 percent of their body weight
in a year and who met at least two of the
other standard criteria for frailty:
self-reported exhaustion, weakness (grip
strength), slow walking speed and low
physical activity. The control group
included five healthy women of similar age.
Each woman received two infusions into a vein, 1 week
apart, of ghrelin or placebo (saline).
The order was assigned randomly, and neither the women nor
the person giving the infusion knew which
one it was.
During the 180-minute infusion, blood samples were taken to
measure ghrelin levels in the body.
Also measured was growth hormone response, because
past studies showed an increase in growth
hormone to ghrelin stimulation, and there
could be benefit to raising growth hormone
levels in this population, according to
Cappola.
After the infusion, the women received a standardized meal,
and the researchers quantified how much they
ate.
Women in both groups ate 51 percent more calories after the
ghrelin infusion than the placebo infusion,
because of increased carbohydrate and
protein intake, not fat, the authors
reported.
Blood levels of growth hormone and ghrelin were higher at
every time point during the ghrelin infusion
than during the placebo infusion.
The only side effect of treatment was a transient sensation
of warmth that four women experienced during
the ghrelin infusion.
“Our study is the first to show an improvement in appetite
and growth hormone levels after
administration of the hormone ghrelin to
frail older women with unexplained weight
loss,” Cappola said.
Future studies, she said, should examine the potential
therapeutic role of ghrelin or similar
agents (ghrelin mimetic agents) in this
population. These agents are available only
for research use now.
The University of Pennsylvania Institute on Aging also
helped fund this study. Carrie Burns, MD,
assistant professor of clinical medicine at
the university, will present the study
results.
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