Cross-Cultural Adaptation and Clinical Validation of the Mini Sarcopenia Risk Assessment Questionnaire in Community-Dwelling Spanish Older Adults

Abstract

(1) Background: The aim was to analyze the reliability and validity of the Spanish version of the Mini Sarcopenia Risk Assessment (MSRA) in older adults. (2) Methods: A total of 136 participants (72.24 ± 5.21 years, 68.38% women) took part in the study. The MSRA includes two questionnaires with seven (MSRA-7) and five items (MSRA-5). First, reliability (inter-rater and test–retest) of the Spanish MSRA was studied, and then the total scores were compared with the presence of sarcopenia according to three different diagnostic criteria and with other parameters related to sarcopenia (clinical validation). (3) Results: The analysis showed excellent inter-rater and test–retest reliability. As for the clinical validation, and regardless of the criteria, both questionnaires had a high sensitivity (81.82–88.89% for the MSRA-5 and 90.91–94.44% for the MSRA-7), while the MSRA-5 showed a better specificity (32.00–33.90%) than the MSRA-7 (20.80–22.88%). Predictive positive values ranged from 9.57–17.02% (MSRA-5) and 9.17–15.54% (MSRA-7), while predictive negative values were high for both the MSRA-5 (95.24%) and the MSRA-7 (96.30–96.43%). The accuracy was better for the MSRA-5 (36.03–41.18%) than the MSRA-7 (26.47–32.35%), as well as the area under the curve (0.67–0.76 vs. 0.65–0.73, respectively). Higher MSRA-5 and MSRA-7 total scores significantly correlated with greater muscle strength, quantity and gait speed. (4) Conclusions: The adaptation of the Spanish MSRA questionnaires was successfully performed, and they are reliable and clinically valid tools for assessing sarcopenia.

Keywords

• sarcopenia
• screening
• reliability
• validation