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RESEARCH PRODUCT

Reproducibility of Regional DEXA Examinations of Abdominal Fat and Lean Tissue

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<b><i>Objective: </i></b>The aim of this study was to develop and test the validity of a new repeatable method to delimit abdominal areas for follow-up of fat mass (FM) and lean tissue mass (LM) in DEXA examinations<i>. </i><b><i>Methods: </i></b>37 male volunteers underwent two DEXA examinations. Total body FM and LM measurements and corresponding abdominal measurements in a carefully defined region were calculated from the first scan. After repositioning of the subjects and a second scan, the delimited region was copied and the abdominal tissues re-calculated. <b><i>Results: </i></b>The mean LM of the abdominal area was 2.804 kg (SD 0.556), and the mean FM was 1.026 kg (SD 0.537). The intra-class correlation coefficient for the repeated abdominal LM, FM, and LM/FM ratio measurements was 0.99. The mean difference (bias) for the repeated abdominal LM measurements was -13 g (95% confidence interval (CI) -193.0 to 166.8), and for the repeated abdominal FM measurements it was -35 g (95% CI -178.9 to 108.5). <b><i>Conclusions: </i></b>The results indicate that regional DEXA is a sensitive method with excellent reproducibility in the measurements of the abdominal fat and lean tissues. The method may serve as a useful tool for evaluation and follow-up of various dietary and training programmes.