Fat of the matter: inflammation, the waist and cardiovascular risk

Abstract

Evaluation of: Rogowski O, Shapira I, Steinvil A, Berliner S: Low grade inflammation in individuals with the hypertriglyceridemic waist phenotype: another feature of the atherogenic dysmetabolism. Metabolism 58, 661–667 (2009). Obesity has become a worldwide epidemic. The metabolic syndrome, a clustering of risk factors leading to insulin sensitivity, is associated with increased risk of diabetes and cardiovascular disease. The hypertriglyceridemic waist phenotype identifies subjects that are obese and have atherogenic dyslipidemia. While both of these definitions identify subjects that are obese and at increased cardiovascular risk, inflammation appears to be a key feature of both of these syndromes. Data from this manuscript indicate that both of these definitions identify subjects with increased cardiometabolic risk. However, it also appears that those that have increased high-sensitivity C-reactive protein levels, a marker of inflammation and cardiovascular risk, have a higher cardiometabolic risk than those without. Thus, assessing the inflammatory burden could be an easy method to identify those subjects who have increased cardiometabolic risk.

Keywords:

• C-reactive protein
• dyslipidemia
• inflammation
• insulin sensitivity
• metabolic syndrome
• obesity
• triglycerides