Association of baseline sex hormone levels with baseline and longitudinal changes in waist-to-hip ratio: Multi-Ethnic Study of Atherosclerosis
Author Interview: Dhananjay Vaidya MD PhD MPH
Assistant Professor of Medicine
Johns Hopkins University
What are the main findings of the study?
In men and postmenopausal women, those with a higher level of naturally occurring estrogen levels tend to become more obese (in terms of waist-to-hip ratio) over time.
Similarly those with a lower level of sex hormone binding protein (SHBG) tend to become more obese over time. Though men with lower testosterone levels are more obese, this is not followed by increasing obesity.
Were any of the findings unexpected?
Our study, along with other studies in the last 5 years, shows that estrogen levels in post-menopausal women are not a health-promoting condition in terms body shape. In past decades, this finding would have been unexpected.
What should clinicians and patients take away from this study?
Because this is an observational study, we should be circumspect about taking away clinical implications. However, it is a strength that we followed up participants over several years: we think that boosting naturally occurring estrogen or testosterone levels in middle aged and older individuals is not likely to improve the time course of obesity.
What recommendations do you have for future research as a result of your study?
To follow up on the previous statement, we need to confirm the effects that treatments to manipulate hormone levels have on obesity. Another area to be researched is about the role of adrenal hormones like DHEA. DHEA can be naturally converted to estrogen or testosterone in the body, but the tendency to be converted to one or the other product differs from person to person. Future research is needed to test if conversion of DHEA to androgens or estrogens is associated with increasing obesity.
Reference:
Association of baseline sex hormone levels with baseline and longitudinal changes in waist-to-hip ratio: Multi-Ethnic Study of Atherosclerosis
D Vaidya, A Dobs, S M Gapstur, S H Golden, M Cushman, K Liu and P Ouyang
International Journal of Obesity , (24 January 2012) | doi:10.1038/ijo.2012.3