Relationships between alanine aminotransferase (ALT),visceral adipose tissue (AT) and metabolic risk factors in a middle-aged Japanese population

Aim: the commonly observed relationship between increased visceral adiposity and metabolic abnormalities may be partly mediated by a concomitant increase in liver fat content. we evaluated the independent association between the level of alanine aminotransferase (alt) as a surrogate marker of the liver fat content and the incidence of metabolic abnormalities after adjusting for the amount of visceral adipose tissue (at). methods: the subjects included 1,118 japanese individuals (44% women) who underwent computed tomography to assess the amount of visceral at on medical checkups. cross-sectional associations between the serum alt,visceral at and metabolic risk factors were examined. results: the alt level and visceral at were found to show a significant correlation (r =0.41 in men and r =0.36 in women,p<0.001). in a multivariable linear regression analysis,the alt level and visceral at were found to be independently associated with blood pressure in men and triglycerides and 2-hour post-challenge glucose in both genders (p<0.01),whereas only visceral at was found to be associated with hdl-cholesterol (p<0.01). when the participants were classified into four subgroups based on the 75th percentiles of alt and visceral at,the low-alt/high-visceral at group,but not the high-alt/low-visceral at group,had a significantly higher odds ratio for low hdl-cholesterol among both genders (p<0.05) and for hypertriglyceridemia in men only (p<0.05). meanwhile,the high-alt/low-visceral at group,but not the low-alt/high-visceral at group,had a significantly higher odds ratio for igt among women (p<0.05). conclusions: although the alt level and visceral at were found to be independently associated with most metabolic risk factors,visceral at had a dominant association with dyslipidemia in both genders,while the alt level appeared to have a closer association with igt in women.