Matsuo H, et al. - This article was written with the objective to depict the relationship between reduced muscle mass and dysphagia in older acute-care patients. Based on the multivariate analysis, calf circumference (CC) was independently connected with Dysphagia Severity Scale (DSS) after adjusting for possible confounders. Future studies to assess dysphagia in acute-care older patients with low skeletal muscle mass (i.e., sarcopenia) are required.

• For this research, they designed a cross-sectional study.
• This study was performed on 103 patients aged ≥ 65 years who were consecutively admitted to acute-care wards.
• Muscle mass and strength were assessed by evaluating calf circumference (CC) and handgrip strength, respectively.
• Dysphagia and swallowing difficulty were evaluated utilizing the Dysphagia Severity Scale (DSS).
• Univariate and multivariate analyses were utilized to figure out if CC was related to dysphagia.
• In this study, there were 58 women and 45 men (mean age, 80 ± 8 years) with a mean CC of 28.2 ± 4.4 cm, and a mean HG of 11.8 kg.
• Dysphagia was seen in eight patients (8%).