骨骼肌是人体最大的组织和器官系统，是机体主要的瘦组织群、蛋白质的主要存在形式。骨骼肌丢失将降低病人对疾病和创伤的耐受能力，降低临床治疗效果，增加并发症发生率，导致病人生命质量降低和死亡风险增加，影响病人预后。外科病人由于原发外科疾病和手术创伤等多种因素使其成为骨骼肌丢失的高发人群。然而，目前临床对于外科病人骨骼肌丢失防治的关注度不足，常被忽视。笔者基于国内外的最新研究，结合团队的临床和研究经验，从外科病人骨骼肌丢失的流行病学特征、骨骼肌丢失对外科病人预后的影响、骨骼肌检测方法以及防治策略进行深入探讨，旨在引起临床医师对外科病人骨骼肌丢失防治的重视。“,”Skeletal muscle is the largest tissue as well as organ of human body. It is also the major form of lean mass and proteins. Loss of skeletal muscle will reduce the tolerance of illness and trauma, negatively affect clinical treatments, increase the incidence of complications and lead to decreasing of quality of life and increasing of mortality, which will affect the prognosis. Due to the factors such as the underlying disease and surgical trauma, patients undergoing surgeries face a high risk of skeletal muscle loss. However, not enough attention has been paid to the prevention and treatment of skeletal muscle loss. Based on the latest researches and his own clinical and research experience, the author discusses the epidemiologic feature of skeletal muscle loss in surgical candi-dates, and the impacts of skeletal muscle loss on prognosis, its detecting methods as well as preven-tion and treatment strategies, in order to raise the awareness of prevention and treatment of skeletal muscle in surgical patients.