More visceral adipose tissue may increase risk for preeclampsia
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Women with higher levels of visceral adipose tissue are more likely to develop preeclampsia than those with less fat, according to findings from a Mendelian randomization published in The Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism.
“Our findings illustrated the causal, independent impact of visceral adipose tissue on preeclampsia and outlined age at menarche as a potential mediator that leads to the risk of preeclampsia incidence,” Yingdong He, MD, PhD, of the department of obstetrics and gynecology at Peking University First Hospital in Beijing, and Yao Lu, PhD, of the Clinical Research Center at The Third Xiangya Hospital of Central South University in Changsha, China, told Healio. “Novel ideas for future preeclampsia prevention approaches include monitoring visceral adipose tissue and age at menarche in women.”
Lu, He and colleagues used univariable and multivariable Mendelian randomization analyses methods to assess associations between genetic variants of visceral adipose tissue (VAT) and preeclampsia as well as whether age at menarche may mediate associations between VAT and preeclampsia. Researchers identified 70 single nucleotide polymorphisms associated with VAT from genome-wide association evaluations of 161,149 women in the UK Biobank. Waist circumference, waist-to-height ratio and hip circumference were obtained. Data for 68 single nucleotide polymorphisms associated with age at menarche were also obtained from the UK Biobank. Preeclampsia summary data were obtained from 3,556 women with preeclampsia and 114,735 controls in the FinnGen genome-wide association study.
In univariable analysis, higher levels of VAT were associated with a greater likelihood of preeclampsia according to the weighted median Mendelian randomization method (OR = 1.83; 95% CI, 1.25-2.68), the inverse-variance weighted method (OR = 1.65; 95% CI, 1.23-2.2) and the maximum likelihood method (OR = 1.67; 95% CI, 1.29-2.15). The findings were similar in multivariable analysis adjusting for waist circumference, waist-to-height ratio and hip circumference.
In mediation analysis, genetically predicted VAT was associated with earlier age at menarche using the Mendelian randomization-Egger method (beta = –0.86; 95% CI, –1.44 to –0.28), the weighted median method (beta = –0.13; 95% CI, – 0.25 to –0.02), the inverse-variance weighted method (beta = –0.33; 95% CI, – 0.49 to –0.16) and the maximum likelihood method (beta = –0.37; 95% CI, – 0.44 to –0.3). Younger age at menarche was associated with higher odds for preeclampsia using the inverse-variance weighted Mendelian randomization method (OR = 0.84; 95% CI, 0.7-0.99) and the maximum likelihood method (OR = 0.83; 95% CI, 0.71-0.97). Age at menarche mediated 14.3% of the indirect effect of genetically predicted VAT on preeclampsia risk.
“Considering the prevalence of obesity is still increasing in many countries and the probability of emerging and reemerging gestational diseases might be high in the future, further mechanisms research and large-scale longitudinal studies are warranted to examine the reliability of visceral adipose tissue as a predictor of preeclampsia risks, explore the mediating mechanisms for potential intervention targets and evaluate the possible nonlinear association,” Lu and He said.
For more information:
Yao Lu, PhD, can be reached at luyao0719@163.com.
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