Visceral adiposity index and the effect of testosterone treatment in young men with congenital hypogonadotropic hypogonadism

C. Haymana; A. Sonmez; A. Aydogdu; A. Taslipinar; C. Meric; Y. Basaran; K. Baskoy; S. Tapan; G. Uckaya; E. Bolu; O. Azal

Introduction: Visceral adipose tissue (VAT) is closely related to metabolic derangement, such as dyslipidemia insulin resistance and type 2 diabetes. Also, there is an increase in deposition of visceral adipose tissue in hypogonadal subjects. The visceral adiposity index (VAI) is a sex-specific mathematical index, based on waist circumference (WC), body mass index (BMI), triglycerides (TG) and HDL cholesterol (HDL) levels, indirectly expressing visceral adipose function. We investigated the VAI in treatment-naive, young men with congenital hypogonadal hypogonadism (CHH) and searched for the effect of testosterone replacement on the VAI of this specific patient group.

Description of methods/design: A total of 190 patients (age 21.9±2.25 years) were enrolled. The control group included 200 age and BMI matched healthy young men (age 21.7±1.5 years). Standard regimen of testosterone esters (250 mg/3 weeks) was given to patients.

Results: The levels of VAI was higher in CHH (P<0.0001) according to healthy controls. The patients had higher WC, TG, HDL cholesterol (P<0.001 for all) levels (Table 1). After 5.52±2.5 months of testosterone treatment WC (P<0.0001), TG (P<0.019), VAI (P<0.002) levels were increased and HDL cholesterol levels were decreased (P<0.0001; Table 1).

**Table 1** The metabolic profiles of the patients with hypogonadism and healthy volunteers
	Patients (n: 190)		Controls (n: 200)	p1	p2
	Before treatment	After Treatment
Age (years)	21.9±2.25	–	21.7±1.5	0.23	–
BMI (kg/m²)	22.0±3.74	22.9±3.3	21.9±1.1	0.179	0.0001
WC (cm)	82.8±10.8	85.6±9.9	76±4.7	0.0001	0.0001
SBP (mmHg)	112.4±9.6	116.1±10.5	107.5±10.7	0.0001	0.001
DBP (mmHg)	71.9±8.0	72.4±8.6	67.7±9.0	0.0001	0.23
TG (mg/dl)	102.5±46.8	109.2±43.5	81.4±42.9	0.0001	0.019
HDL (mg/dl)	46.7±11.4	42.6±10.6	53.1±9.8	0.0001	0.0001
VAI	3.1±1.8	3.6±1.6	2.0±1.4	0.0001	0.002
p1, patients vs controls; p2, before treatment vs after treatment; BMI, body mass index; WC, waist circumference; SBP, systolic blood pressure; DBP, diastolic blood pressure; TG, trigliseride; HDL, high density lipoprotein; VAI, visceral adiposity index.

Conclusion: This study shows that VAI levels are increased in treatment-naive, young men with CHH and after the testosterone replacement, the VAI levels are increased further.

Declaration of interest: The authors declare that there is no conflict of interest that could be perceived as prejudicing the impartiality of the research project.

Funding: This research did not receive any specific grant from any funding agency in the public, commercial or not-for-profit sector.

Endocrine Abstracts

P1047