Clinical significance of an elevated ankle-brachial index differs depending on the amount of appendicular muscle mass: the J-SHIPP and Nagahama studies

Clinical implication of a high ankle-brachial index (ABI) is not well known. Based on our previous study, we suspected that body composition may be a determinant of a high ABI and may consequently modulate the clinical significance of a high ABI. Datasets of two studies with independent cohorts, the anti-aging study cohort (n = 1765) and the Nagahama study cohort (n = 8,039), were analyzed in this study, in which appendicular muscle mass was measured by computed tomography and bioelectrical impedance analysis, respectively. Brachial and ankle blood pressures were measured using a cuff-oscillometric method. In the anti-aging study cohort, thigh muscle area (β = 0.387, p