Research Paper Volume 6, Issue 5 pp 380—389
Short leukocyte telomere length is associated with obesity in American Indians: The strong heart family study
- 1 Department of Epidemiology, School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine, Tulane University, New Orleans, LA 70112, USA
- 2 Department of Evidence Based Medicine and Division of Population Genetics, State Key Laboratory of Cardiovascular Disease, Cardiovascular Institute and Fuwai Hospital, National Center for Cardiovascular Diseases, Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences and Peking Union Medical College, Beijing, China
- 3 Center for American Indian Health Research, University of Oklahoma Health Science Center, Oklahoma City, OK 73104, USA
- 4 Department of Biochemistry and Biophysics, University of California, San Francisco, CA 94143, USA
- 5 MedStar Health Research Institute, Hyattsville, MD 20782, and Georgetown/Howard Universities Center for Clinical and Translational Science, Washington, DC 20007, USA
Received: April 14, 2014 Accepted: May 10, 2014 Published: May 15, 2014
https://doi.org/10.18632/aging.100664How to Cite
Abstract
Shorter leukocyte telomere length (LTL) has been associated with a wide range of age-related disorders including cardiovascular disease (CVD) and diabetes. Obesity is an important risk factor for CVD and diabetes. The association of LTL with obesity is not well understood. This study for the first time examines the association of LTL with obesity indices including body mass index, waist circumference, percent body fat, waist-to-hip ratio, and waist-to-height ratio in 3,256 American Indians (14-93 years old, 60% women) participating in the Strong Heart Family Study. Association of LTL with each adiposity index was examined using multivariate generalized linear mixed model, adjusting for chronological age, sex, study center, education, lifestyle (smoking, alcohol consumption, and total energy intake), high-sensitivity C-reactive protein, hypertension and diabetes. Results show that obese participants had significantly shorter LTL than non-obese individuals (age-adjusted P=0.0002). Multivariate analyses demonstrate that LTL was significantly and inversely associated with all of the studied obesity parameters. Our results may shed light on the potential role of biological aging in pathogenesis of obesity and its comorbidities.