Aim: The aim of this study was to prospectively explore how laboratory and anthropometric risk factors predicted subclinical organ damage in 255 patients, with type 2 diabetes, after four years.
Methods: Baseline investigations were performed in 2006 and were repeated at follow-up in 2010. Carotid intima-media thickness (IMT) was evaluated by ultrasonography and aortic pulse wave velocity (PWV) was measured with applanation tonometry over the carotid and femoral arteries at baseline and at follow-up in a cohort of subjects with type 2 diabetes aged 55-65 years old.
Results: There were significant correlations between apolipoprotein B (apoB) (r= 0.144, p=0.03), C - reactive protein (CRP) (r=0.172, p=0.009) at baseline and IMT measured at follow-up. After adjustment for sex, age, treatment with statins and Hba1c, the associations remained statistically significant. HbA1c, total cholesterol or LDL-cholesterol did not correlate to IMT at follow-up. Baseline body mass index (BMI) (r=0.130, p=0.049), waist circumference (WC) (r=0.147, p=0.027) and sagittal Abdominal Diameter (SAD) (r=0.184, p=0.007) correlated to PWV at follow-up. Challenged with sex, SBP and HbA1c, the association between SAD, not WC nor BMI, and PWV remained statistically significant (p=0.036). In a stepwise linear regression, entering both SAD and WC, the association between SAD and PWV was stronger than the association between WC and PWV.
Conclusion: We conclude that apoB and CRP, but not LDL-cholesterol predicted subclinical atherosclerosis. Furthermore, SAD was more independent in predicting arterial stiffness over time, compared with WC, in middle-aged men and women with type 2 diabetes.