Obesity and the clinical use of serum GGT activity as a marker of heavy drinking

Abstract

Objective. Gamma‐glutamyl transferase (GGT) is a widely used clinical marker of alcohol abuse. However, although obesity may also elevate serum GGT activities, the effects of overweight on the interpretation of GGT testing have remained poorly defined. Material and methods. GGT activities from 1147 moderate drinkers and 449 abstainers who were classified according to body mass index (BMI) were compared with those of 208 heavy drinkers admitted for detoxification. Results. GGT upper normal limits, defined based on normal weight abstainers (men 53 U/L; women 45 U/L) were lower than those based on moderate drinkers (men 68 U/L; women 50 U/L). The relative increases in GGT activities in male moderate drinkers with overweight (54%) or obesity (125%) exceeded the corresponding changes found in women (25% and 75%, respectively). The BMI‐dependent variation on the sensitivity of GGT for correctly classifying heavy drinkers ranged from 29% to 67%. The rates of false‐positive values in the subgroups from low to high BMI varied from 0% to 27%, respectively. Conclusions. The data indicate that the diagnostic value of serum GGT testing could be improved by using reference data derived from databases of abstainers with normal weight or BMI‐based categorization of reference ranges.

• Biomarkers
• BMI
• ethanol
• gamma‐glutamyl transferase
• liver
• reference values
• sensitivity
• specificity

Acknowledgements

The help of Professor Pål Rustad, Fürst Medical Laboratory, Oslo, Norway, for providing data on GGT measurements in the Nordic NORIP Survey is gratefully acknowledged. The studies were supported in part by a grant from the Finnish Foundation for Alcohol Studies.