Influence of diet, exercise, and serum vitamin d on sarcopenia in postmenopausal women.

What Was Tested

This randomized controlled trial looks at Vitamin D, K2, Magnesium and Zinc.

The objective of this study is to investigate the effects of 12 months of dietary weight loss and/or aerobic exercise on lean mass and the measurements defining sarcopenia in postmenopausal women and to examine the potential moderating effect of serum 25-hydroxyvitamin D (25(OH)D) and age.

Who Took Part

PubMed indexes the participants as middle-aged adults, women only.

Four hundred thirty-nine overweight and obese postmenopausal women were randomized to diet modification (N = 118), exercise (N = 117), diet + exercise (N = 117), or control (N = 87).

How the Study Was Run

In design terms this was a randomized study.

Random assignment meant chance, not the researchers, decided who got Vitamin D, K2, Magnesium and Zinc and who got the comparison, which limits bias.

The exercise intervention was 45 min·d, 5 d·wk, of moderate-to-vigorous intensity aerobic activity.

Total and appendicular lean mass (ALM) were quantified by dual x-ray absorptiometry at baseline and 12 months.

A skeletal muscle index (SMI = ALM (kg) / height (m)) and the prevalence of sarcopenia (SMI <5.67 kg·m) were calculated.

Serum 25(OH)D was assayed using a competitive chemiluminescent immunoassay.

What Was Measured

Topics PubMed links to this paper include Confidence Intervals, Diet, Exercise, Obesity, Outcome Assessment, Health Care, Postmenopause and Sarcopenia.

What This Means in Plain Language

The paper is a randomized study of Vitamin D, K2, Magnesium and Zinc.

Its findings take up roughly 5 sentences of the abstract and are left out here on purpose; the source paper is the place to read them.

The publication is from 2013 (Medicine and science in sports and exercise), a journal based in United States.

More context: the Vitamin D, K2, Magnesium and Zinc compound page, all human trials.