|
(Ivanhoe Newswire) -- Dialysis patients with low body fat are at increased risk of death -- even compared to patients at the highest level of body fat percentage.
"Our study indicates that body fat may be protective in dialysis patients," Kamyar Kalantar-Zadeh, Ph.D., of UCLA, was quoted as saying. "The results add to the increasing number of reports about the 'obesity paradox' or 'reverse epidemiology' in patients with chronic kidney disease and other chronic diseases."
Text Continues Below
Nephrologists have puzzled over the "obesity paradox" in dialysis patients, Dr. Kalantar-Zadeh explained. "Counter-intuitively, higher body mass index is associated with greater survival in hemodialysis patients. We hypothesized that very low body fat -- less than 10 percent -- would be a strong predictor of mortality."
The researchers measured body fat percentage in 671 hemodialysis patients from eight California dialysis centers. They then compared five-year mortality rates for patients at different levels of body fat percentage.
The mortality rate was 2.5 to 3 times higher for dialysis patients with less than 10 percent body fat than for those with body fat of 20 to 30 percent. The increased risk of death for patients with very low body fat remained after adjustment for age, sex, race and other illnesses.
Further analyses confirmed a direct, linear relationship between body fat and mortality risk. "The higher the body fat, the greater the survival," said Dr. Kalantar-Zadeh. However, Dr. Kalantar-Zadeh pointed out, "In addition, we estimated body fat by measuring the subcutaneous fat of the upper arm, which may be different from the intra-abdominal fat."
SOURCE: Presented at the American Society of Nephrology Annual Meeting, San Diego, October 31, 2009
If this story or any other Ivanhoe story has impacted your life or prompted you or someone you know to seek or change treatments, please let us know by contacting Melissa Medalie at mmedalie@ivanhoe.com
This article was reported by Ivanhoe.com, who offers Medical Alerts by e-mail every day of the week. To subscribe, go to: http://www.ivanhoe.com/newsalert/.
|
.gif)
