Atrial Fibrillation and Lipid-related Indices in Japanese Men: An Age-matched Case-control Study.

BACKGROUND/AIM: Atrial fibrillation (AF) is associated with cardiovascular risk factors. Although certain lipid-related indices, including the ratio of low-density lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol to high-density lipoprotein (HDL) cholesterol (LDL-C/HDL-C), the ratio of triglycerides to HDL-C (TG/HDL-C), lipid accumulation product (LAP), cardiometabolic index (CMI) and the ratio of gamma-glutamyltransferase to HDL-C (GGT/HDL-C), are known to predict cardiovascular disease, their relationship with AF is unclear.

PATIENTS AND

METHODS

The participants included 154 men (median of age: 66 years) with AF and 308 age-matched men without AF. Cardiovascular risk factors, including obesity indices, blood pressure, blood lipids and hemoglobin A1C, as well as lipid-related indices, were compared between the groups with and without AF.

RESULTS

Body mass index, waist circumference and GGT were significantly higher or larger in participants with AF than in those without AF, while LDL-C was significantly lower in the AF group than in the control group. TG, HDL-C and hemoglobin A1C were not significantly different between the two groups. LAP and GGT/HDL-C were significantly higher and LDL-C/HDL-C was significantly lower in the AF group than in the control group, whereas TG/HDL-C and CMI were not significantly different between the two groups. Then, a new lipid-related index (AF risk index: AFRI), defined as the product of waist circumference and GGT divided by LDL-C, was proposed and shown to be associated with AF more strongly than each cardiovascular risk factor alone.

CONCLUSION

LAP and GGT/HDL-C were positively associated with AF, whereas LDL-C/HDL-C was inversely associated with AF. AFRI may be a useful marker for discriminating the risk of AF.