Endocrine Abstracts

Background: Visceral obesity has been associated with systemic oxidative stress, measured by oxidized LDL (oxLDL).

Aim: Investigate circulating oxLDL levels in patients with visceral obesity, and its relationship with metabolic abnormalities found in visceral obesity.

Methods: We evaluated blood pressure (BP), waist circumference (WC), fasting glucose, total cholesterol, LDL, HDL, triglycerides, ApoA1, ApoB, ApoCIII, Lp(a) and oxLDL in 100 asymptomatic non-smoking patients (56 men/44 women) aged 50–60 years, without cardiovascular disease.

Subjects were grouped as it follows: i) WC<102 cm in men and WC<88 cm in women; ii) WC≥102 cm in men and WC≥88 cm in women. Data processed in SPSS 16.0.

Results: Subjects with increased WC had higher systolic BP (women: 135+/−24 vs 146+/−27 mmHg, P<0.05; men: 134+/−22 vs 145+/−25 mmHg, P<0.05), higher levels of triglycerides (women: 129.5+/−54.0 vs 172.9+/−13.0 mg/dl, P<0.05; men: 132.2+/−18.0 vs 183.6+/−76.0 mg/dl, P<0.01) and ApoCIII (women: 8.8+/−4.3 vs 12.3+/−9.9 mmHg, P<0.01; men: 9.4+/−5.3 vs 14.4+/−7.4 mmHg, P<0.01), and lower HDL (women: 56.8+ /−11.8 vs 47.3+/−13.4 mg/dl, P<0.05; men: 44.5+/−11.1 vs 36.8+/ −10.4 mg/dl, P<0.05) and ApoA1 (women: 170.0+/−22.6 vs 152.6+/ −27.6 mg/dl, P<0.05; men: 144.6+/−22.3 vs 133.2+/−24.2 mg/dl, P<0.05). There was no significant difference (P>0.05) between the groups in fasting glucose, LDL, ApoB and Lp(a) levels; however, those with increased WC had higher levels of oxLDL (women: 59.8+/−14.7 vs 67.8+/−14.8 mg/dl, P<0.05; men: 61.3+/−21.1 vs 69.0+/−19.5 mg/dl, P<0.05).

OxLDL was positively correlated with WC (r=0.86, P<0.01), systolic BP (r=0.27, P<0.05), plasma triglyceride (r=0.29, P<0.05), ApoCIII (r=0.38, P<0.05), LDL (r=0.51, P<0.01) and ApoB (r=0.54, P<0.01); and negatively correlated with HDL (r=−0.26, P<0.01) and ApoA1 (r=−0.20, P<0.01).

Conclusion: The study showed that high WC was strongly associated with high levels of oxLDL.

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.

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