Daniel Rojano-Ortega; Heliodoro Moya-Amaya; Antonio Jesús Berral-Aguilar; Antonio Molina-López & Francisco José Berral-de la Rosa

Bioelectrical impedance analysis (BIA) is a non-invasive, economic and fast method for body composition assessment. Phase angle (PhA) is considered an indicator of cellular health and cell membrane integrity, and it seems to be related to physical capacity and performance. The aim of this study was to analyze the possible relationships between PhA and skeletal muscle mass percentage (SMM%) and between PhA and fat mass percentage (FM%) in a healthy Caucasian population with a wide age range. 210 healthy Caucasian participants (99 women and 111 men), aged 20–70 years were analyzed. A BIA foot-to-hand body composition analyzer (BIA-101, AKERN-Srl, Firenze, Italy) was used to determine bioelectrical parameters, and a whole body DXA scanner QDR, serie Horizon (Hologic Inc., Bedford, MA, USA) was used for SMM% and FM% assessment. Irrespective of age range, strong positive significant correlations were observed between PhA and SMM% (0.520-0.687; p < 0.01) and strong (or moderate/strong) negative significant correlations were observed between PhA and FM% (0.492-0.657; p < 0.01). These correlations indicate that PhA could be used as a marker to monitor the evolution of an active subject, whether an athlete or not. It would be useful to develop and validate new equations for skeletal muscle mass and fat mass assessment, which include PhA as a bioelectrical parameter.

KEY WORDS: Body composition; Performance; BIA; DXA.

ROJANO-ORTEGA, D.; MOYA-AMAYA, H.; BERRAL- AGUILAR, A. J.; MOLINA-LÓPEZ, A. & BERRAL-DE LA ROSA, F. J. Correlation of phase angle with muscle and fat mass in a healthy caucasian population of a wide age range. Int. J. Morphol., 42(4):918-922, 2024.