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Blood Lead Level Is Associated with Visceral Adipose Dysfunction in Patients with Type 2 Diabetes

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Abstract

We aimed to explore whether an elevated blood lead level (BLL) is associated with visceral adipose dysfunction in patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM). Four thousand one hundred and fourteen diabetic participants were enrolled from seven communities in Shanghai in 2018 in the cross-sectional METAL study. BLL was measured by graphite furnace atomic absorption spectrometry. Visceral adiposity index (VAI) and lipid accumulation product (LAP)were calculated by simple anthropometric and biochemical parameters. We found that medians (IQR) of BLL were 26.0 μg/L (18.0–37.0) for men and 25.0 μg/L (18.0–35.0) for women, respectively. In men, each doubling of BLL was associated with a 2.0% higher VAI (95% CI, 0.6 to 3.5%) and 1.8% higher LAP (95% CI, 0.2 to 3.3%) after full adjustment. Using the lowest BLL quartile as the referent group, significant positive trends were observed for BLL with VAI and LAP. In women, each doubling of BLL was associated with a 1.9% higher LAP (95% CI, 0.6 to 3.1%). Additionally, there was a marginally significant positive association between BLL and VAI, either using log2-transformed concentrations as continuous variables or categorized in quartiles. In conclusion, lead exposure is associated with visceral adipose dysfunction in patients with T2DM. Further prospective studies are warranted to confirm our findings.

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Data Availability

The datasets during and/or analyzed during the current study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.

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Acknowledgements

The authors thank all research staff and participants in the METAL study.

Funding

This study was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (82100846; 82170870; 82120108008), Shanghai Sailing Program (20YF1423500), Science and Technology Commission of Shanghai Municipality (19140902400), and Clinical Research Plan of SHDC (SHDC2020CR4006).

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  1. Chi Chen and Bin Wang contributed equally to this work.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute and Department of Endocrinology and Metabolism, Shanghai Ninth People’s Hospital, Shanghai JiaoTong University School of Medicine, 639, Zhizaoju Road, Shanghai, 200011, China

    Chi Chen, Bin Wang, Haojie Zhang, Yuying Wang, Yi Chen, Fangzhen Xia, Hualing Zhai & Yingli Lu

  2. Institute of Precision Medicine, Shanghai Ninth People’s Hospital, Shanghai JiaoTong University School of Medicine, Shanghai, China

    Shiyan Yu

  3. Department of Anesthesiology, Shenzhen People’s Hospital (The Second Clinical Medical College, Jinan University, The First Affiliated Hospital, Southern University of Science and Technology), Shenzhen, China

    Shuo Zhou

  4. Department of Endocrinology and Metabolism, Huangpu Branch, Shanghai Ninth People’s Hospital, Shanghai JiaoTong University School of Medicine, Shanghai, China

    Ningjian Wang

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  1. Chi Chen
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Contributions

Y.L., N.W., and H.Z. designed the study, contributed to the discussion, reviewed and edited the manuscript, and takes full responsibility for the work as a whole. C.C. designed the study, performed analysis, wrote the manuscript, and contributed to the discussion. C.C. and B.W. conducted the research, analyzed the data, and reviewed and edited the manuscript. H.Z., Y.W., S.Y., S.Z., Y.C., and F.X. conducted the research as well as contributed to the discussion.

Corresponding authors

Correspondence to Hualing Zhai, Ningjian Wang or Yingli Lu.

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Ethical approval was obtained from the Ethics Committee of Shanghai Ninth People’s Hospital, Shanghai Jiaotong University School of Medicine. All participants provided written informed consent at enrolment.

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The authors declare no competing interests.

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Ningjian Wang and Hualing Zhai are co-corresponding authors.

Yingli Lu (she should receive the proofs and will handle correspondence at all stages of refereeing and publication, also post-publication).

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Chen, C., Wang, B., Zhang, H. et al. Blood Lead Level Is Associated with Visceral Adipose Dysfunction in Patients with Type 2 Diabetes. Biol Trace Elem Res 201, 2266–2273 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12011-022-03357-6

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