Phase angle and impedance ratio: Two specular ways to analyze body composition

Abstract

A high metabolic rate, occurring in cancer or other in-flammatory diseases, impairs body composition. To date, scientific literature recognizes to Bioelectrical Impedance Analysis (BIA)-derived Phase Angle (PhA) a strong prognostic value in several oncological diseases. IR is a ratio between two impedances (at 5 and 200 kHz), obtained by multi-frequency BIA; it is simple and easy to measure, and it may discriminate different hydration status in several diseases. The aim of this work is to present the correlation between PhA and Impedance Ratio (IR) in different clinical settings (227 subjects).Our data show a strong inverse correlation between PhA and IR in all patients: the lower is PhA, the higher is IR. Further studies are needed to correlate IR to clinical outcomes.