Research

Hormonal

In elderly individuals, lower circulating levels of Insulin-like Growth Factor-1 (IGF-1) and Mechanical Growth Factor (MGF) are independently associated with reduced appendicular skeletal muscle mass (ASMI) and sarcopenia.

If you are over 60, your natural production of IGF-1 and MGF declines, which contributes to muscle loss. While you cannot easily change your age, you can support your hormonal health through adequate protein intake (at least 0.6 g/kg/day) and resistance training, which may help mitigate the decline in these growth factors.

ModerateSupportsMEDIUM confidence
The results of this study also showed that IGF-1 was positively correlated with GH, T, MGF, BMI, BMC, and Hb... The multivariable regression analysis... showed that IGF-1, MGF, BMI, and gender were independently associated with ASMI (all P < 0.05).
Ai-Lin Bian et al. · BMC Musculoskeletal Disorders · 2020

Why this rating

The study is a large cross-sectional observational study (n=3276) with strong statistical significance, but lacks causal inference due to the lack of longitudinal or interventional data.

Source

Association between sarcopenia and levels of growth hormone and insulin-like growth factor-1 in the elderly

Ai-Lin Bian et al. · BMC Musculoskeletal Disorders · 2020

DOI 10.1186/s12891-020-03236-y

cross_sectional · n=3276Cited 204×
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DOI resolved against Crossref · corpus check 2026-06-10

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