Statistical analysis
sarcopenia, skeletal muscle mass, sarcopenic
SARCOPENIA
For the RCT arm, only sarcopenic cases who completed both follow-up assessments were included in the analysis, consistent with the per-protocol approach. The Shapiro-Wilk test was used to assess the normal distribution of continuous variables, which were presented as mean ± standard deviation (SD) with a 95% confidence interval (CI). Depending on the normality of the distribution, between-group comparisons were conducted using either one-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) or the Mann-Whitney U test. Categorical data, presented as numerical values and percentages, were analyzed employing the chi-squared (for non-sparse data) or Fisher’s exact tests (for sparse data). Pearson’s correlation coefficient (r) was utilized to quantify the correlation between target biomarkers and grip strength as well as skeletal muscle mass index.To evaluate the influence of exercise and nutritional intervention on target biomarkers in individuals with sarcopenia, a Kruskal-Wallis ANOVA was conducted. The association between selected target biomarkers (exhibiting significant differences between sarcopenic cases and controls) and variables such as age, gender, sarcopenia, and intervention were examined using the generalized estimating equation (GEE) [