Endocrine Abstracts

Introduction: Eligibility for bariatric surgery in the Unighted Kingdom is based on specific body mass index (BMI) thresholds and the presence of obesity-associated complications. Patients with partial lipodystrophy (LD) often have an abundance of metabolic and cardiovascular complications, but their abdominal adiposity does not always substantially increase BMI. The consequence is that patients with LD may be inappropriately excluded from obesity treatments when judged by BMI...

Background: Abdominal fat accumulation is a risk factor for type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease, whereas lower body fat is protective. Erythroferrone (ERFE) is a recently discovered protein that increases intestinal iron absorption by inhibiting hepcidin. ERFE has been shown to inhibit BMP2 signalling and work from our group has shown that BMP2 is a differentiation factor for subcutaneous abdominal, but not gluteal, adipocytes. Because of this, we hypothesised that ERFE...

Aims: Body composition is associated with bone mineral density, but the precise associations between body fat distribution and bone mineral density (BMD) remain unclear. We hypothesised that the regional adipose tissue depots would have independent associations with BMD.Methods: We used data from 4900 healthy individuals aged 30–50 years old from the Oxford Biobank to analyse associations between regional fat mass and lean mass with total BMD.<p...

Men have a higher prevalence and risk of non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) than age-matched women and this may, in part, be related to differences in fatty acid oxidation. Fasting and postprandial fatty acid oxidation was investigated in 11 healthy men and 11 healthy women matched for age (46±2 years vs 46±2 years (mean±S.E.M.)), BMI (28.0±1 vs 27.0±1 kg/m2) and liver fat content (3.4±0.9 vs 3.9±0.7%) measure...

Background: Carbohydrate-restricted diets in type 1 diabetes mellitus (T1DM) are highly controversial. A commonly held concern is that a low carbohydrate diet may more readily result in conversion to diabetic ketoacidosis – one of the most severe complications of poorly managed T1DM. Of note, there is no clear evidence for this phenomenon. We evaluated metabolic profiles in patients with T1DM who had self-selected carbohydrate-restricted diets.<p clas...

Fat distribution influences metabolic risk. Accumulation of fat in the upper body increases metabolic risk, while lower body adipose expansion is protective. Oestrogen promotes lower body adiposity; transgender women on oestrogen therapy show increases in gluteal adipose, while transition to the menopause is associated with a shift in fat distribution towards the upper body, concurrent with changes in metabolic risk. Still, mechanisms governing the depot-specific effects of oe...

Background: Type III hyperlipidaemia (T3HL) is characterised by equimolar increases in plasma triglyceride and cholesterol on an APOE2/2 genotype background and conveys a high risk of early-onset cardiovascular disease (CVD). Phenotypic penetrance of T3HL is <10% and precipitated by several endocrine/metabolic disorders such as obesity, diabetes and hypothyroidism. We explored the effect of triglyceride-raising polygenic score precipitating T3HL, in the context of...

Bile acids (BAs) are synthesised from cholesterol in the liver and promote lipid digestion. An emerging body of evidence, however, suggests that BAs are also key signaling molecules with potent metabolic and endocrine functions, exerting their effects through activation of BA receptors, including the farnesoid-X- (FXR) and the G-protein-coupled- (TGR5) receptors. Disturbed BA synthesis has been associated with type 2 diabetes mellitus and insulin resistance, and recent studies...

Background and Aim: Hepatic de novo lipogenesis (DNL) has been implicated in the development of non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD). Supplementation with the omega-3 fatty acids (FA) eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA) and docosahexaenoic acid (DHA) decreases intrahepatic triacylglycerol (IHTAG) and plasma TAG concentrations, which is suggested to be mediated through changes in hepatic DNL. We investigated the effects of omega-3 FA supplementation on intrahepatic DNL an...

Intracellular cortisol is regulated by 11βHSD1. Although the field has focused on regeneration of cortisol from inert cortisone by 11β-reductase activity of 11βHSD1, we have used stable isotope tracers and arteriovenous sampling to quantify simultaneous dehydrogenase (cortisone generation) and reductase (cortisol regeneration) in human adipose and skeletal muscle. In vitro studies suggest insulin regulates this balance of reductase vs dehydrogenase acti...