Cachexia: Symptoms, Causes, Treatment

Cachexia (synonyms: Emaciation; Denutrition; Inanition; Kachexia; Cachexia Syndrome; Cancerous Cachexia; Malignant Cachexia; Pedatrophy; Infantile Dystrophy; Tumor Cachexia; ICD-10-GM R64: Cachexia) describes the emaciation of the organism (emaciation) due to profound disturbance of one or more organ functions.

Cachexia is defined as follows:

  • Within a maximum of 12 months, 5% of body weight is lost
  • BMI (body mass index) is < 20 and weight loss is more than 2% within two months
  • There is sarcopenia (muscle weakness or muscle wasting) and the weight loss is more than 2%, without already refractory cachexia (pathological weight loss in a very advanced stage) is present

Cachexia is generally defined as a complex, multifactorial syndrome in chronic diseases leading to weight loss.

Cachexia occurs mainly in the following diseases:

  • Tumor diseases (cancers) – so-called “tumor cachexia” in the context of advanced tumor diseases; patients with tumor diseases of the gastrointestinal tract (gastrointestinal tract), lung and pancreas (pancreas) are particularly severely affected; in about 80% of patients with pancreatic or gastric carcinoma, significant weight loss already occurs before diagnosis
  • Acute or chronic infectious diseases – e.g. tuberculosis.
  • Metabolic disorders – e.g. liver or kidney failure; diabetes mellitus type 1.
  • Other diseases – e.g. chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD = “chronic obstructive lung disease” or “chronic obstructive pulmonary disease“; prevalence (disease frequency): -85%); advanced heart failure (= cardiac cachexia; prevalence: 5-20%).

Cachexia describes the complete depletion of storage fat depots and loss of muscle and is accompanied by atrophy (wasting) of organs and various tissues.

Course and prognosis: The course and prognosis depend on the underlying disease. If tumor cachexia is present, this is considered an unfavorable prognostic factor with respect to survival.