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ORIGINAL RESEARCH ARTICLE

Subcutaneous Fat Accumulation Shows a Beneficial Correlation with Serum Cholesterol in Postmenopausal Japanese Women

Misuzu Tanaka^*, Ririko Koga^*, Hiroko Tsuda^*, Katsumi Imai^*, Shimako Abe^*, Takashi Masuda^*, Masako Iwamoto^*, Eri Nakazono^*, Tomoko Kamohara^*, Naoko Kinukawa and Toshiie Sakata^*,1

^* Health Promotion Center, Nakamura-Gakuen University, Fukuoka, Japan; and Department of Medical Information Science, Kyushu University Hospital, Fukuoka, Japan

To whom requests for reprints should be addressed at ¹ Department of Nutritional Sciences, Faculty of Nutritional Science, Nakamura-Gakuen University, 5-7-1 Befu, Jounan-Ku, Fukuoka 814-0198, Japan. E-mail: sakata{at}nakamura-u.ac.jp

This study aimed to investigate whether accumulation of subcutaneous abdominal fat has a beneficial correlation with lipid metabolism in premenopausal and/or postmenopausal Japanese women. The study enrolled 146 premenopausal women, ranging in age from 19 to 54 years, and 82 postmeno-pausal women, ranging in age from 47 to 66 years. Fat distribution, including abdominal visceral fat area (VFA) and abdominal subcutaneous fat area (SFA), were measured in an outpatient clinic by magnetic resonance imaging. Homogeneity of the regression slopes for SFA to total cholesterol (P = 0.030), low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (P = 0.020), apolipoprotein B (apoB) (P = 0.001), and the ratio of apoB to apolipoprotein A-I (apoA-I) (P = 0.003) were not found between premenopausal and postmenopausal women, even after adjustment for both VFA and age. However, the regression slopes for VFA to all measured lipid parameters, as well as apolipoproteins, were homogeneous between the premenopausal and postmeno-pausal groups. Abdominal SFA in postmenopausal women correlated negatively with total cholesterol (P = 0.007), low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (P = 0.002), apoB (P < 0.001), and the ratio of apoB to apoA-I (P = 0.001), after adjustment for age and VFA, but this was not the case in premenopausal women. The mechanisms involved in the beneficial effects of subcutaneous fat accumulation in postmenopausal women remain obscure, but upregulated aromatase expression, derived from adipose tissue, may possibly improve lipid and apolipoprotein metabolism.

Key Words: subcutaneous fat accumulation • postmenopausal women • LDL-cholesterol • aromatase activity in adipocytes