Does lacking testosterone make men frail?

Syndey : Lack of testosterone seems to make older men frail.

“We don’t completely understand how people become frail, but our study suggests that testosterone might play a role in men,” said Zoë Hyde, who led the study.

“Not everyone becomes frail as they age, so we’re hoping to find out why some people develop this condition,” added Hyde from the University of Western Australia’s Centre for Health and Ageing.

Frailty is a state that occurs when a person nears the limits of their health reserves, which can lead to more serious illness or even death.

“There have been tremendous gains in life expectancy in recent decades, but we want to make those extra years of life healthier,” Hyde said.

The researchers measured frailty by looking for impairment in at least three of five areas.

They include fatigue, difficulty climbing a flight of stairs, difficulty walking more than one block, having more than five major medical conditions like diabetes, heart disease or arthritis or an unintentional weight loss of more than five percent during the follow-up period, said a University of Western Australia release.

The study followed a subset of more than 3,000 healthy men aged 70 years and over for up to seven years. The findings were published in the Journal of Clinical Endocrinology and Metabolism.

“We’ve found a link between low testosterone and frailty, but we need to be sure that there isn’t some other factor involved,” Hyde said.

“Large-scale clinical trials are needed first to see if testosterone can prevent or treat frailty, and to assess the benefits and risks of therapy,” concluded Hyde.

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