Odense Androgen Study in the Elderly

Introduction

Male ageing is associated with sarcopenia, frailty, osteopenia, obesity, the metabolic syndrome and cardiovascular disease. To what extent the androgens affect these signs of ageing is still largely undetermined. A few studies have shown divergent results concerning the relation between ageing and serum levels of testosterone. It still remains to be shown whether there is a pure age-related decline in serum testosterone or whether other factors such as obesity, chronic illness or medication are responsible for the lower serum testosterone found in elderly men when compared with young men. To investigate these issues a cohort of 600 men aged 60 to 75 years is examined.

Objective

The aim of the study is to investigate the relation of testosterone (T) to body composition (BC) and physical performance (PP). Measures for BC are muscle mass (MM), bone mineral density (BMD) and fat mass (FM). Parameters for PP are maximum voluntary force (MVF), maximum oxygen uptake (VO2max) and muscle power (P). We hypothesize that T is positively associated with MM, BMD and all PP parameters, but negatively associated with FM. We will furthermore examine whether life style, medication, chronic disease, hormones and binding proteins exert their actions on BC and PP solely through or independently of T. The levels of s-total and free T in this cohort will be compared with the s-total and free T levels from a cohort of young men aged 20 to 30 years. Furthermore the associations found between T and BC and PP in the two cohorts will be compared to investigate whether T plays the same role in the two groups.

Methods