Inflammation Is Strongly Associated With Cardiorespiratory Fitness, Sex, BMI, and the Metabolic Syndrome in a Self-reported Healthy Population: HUNT3 Fitness Study

Abstract

To investigate whether C-reactive protein (CRP, a general marker of inflammation), neopterin (activated macrophages), lactoferrin (activated neutrophils), and endothelial function (flowmediated vasodilation, FMD) are associated with cardiorespiratory fitness (peak oxygen uptake, VO2peak), gender, BMI and the metabolic syndrome in a healthy adult population. Patients and Methods:This was a cross-sectional association study based on the population-based HUNT3 Fitness Study performed from 05/15/2007 through 06/23/2008. Seven hundred and forty self-reported healthy respondents (307 women) identified with the metabolic syndrome were age-and sexmatched with 692 controls (327 women) from the same cohort. Associations between the inflammatory biomarkers and VO2peak, FMD, and the metabolic syndrome, were analyzed by multivariate linear and logistic regression. Results:CRP was negatively associated with VO2peak (P<.001), positively associated with the metabolic syndrome with a stronger effect in men (P<.001), positively associated with BMI with a stronger effect in women (P<.01), but not with FMD (P=.34). Lactoferrin was positively associated with the metabolic syndrome (P<.001), but neither neopterin nor lactoferrin were associated with VO2peak or FMD. Conclusion:CRP was strongly associated with VO2peak and the metabolic syndrome, but not with FMD.The associations between inflammation, VO2peak and the metabolic syndrome were strongly Alphabetical list of abbreviations BMI body mass index CAD coronary artery disease CRP C-reactive protein FMD flow-mediated dilation MetSyn metabolic syndrome VO2peak peak oxygen uptake

Association between Cardiorespiratory Fitness and Circulating Proteins in 50-Year-Old Swedish Men and Women: a Cross-Sectional Study

“…There is increasing recognition of inflammation as a key pathogenic mechanism in atherosclerosis and the development of cardiovascular disease [ 50 , 53 – 57 ]. Adipose tissue has been suggested to play a key pro-inflammatory role in mediating associations between physical activity and inflammation [ 47 , 58 ]. In the present study, cardiorespiratory fitness was associated with both IL-6 and IL-1RA independent of body fat, indicating other potential pathways as previously discussed [ 59 ].…”

“…First, the inverse association between better cardiorespiratory fitness and lower levels of the inflammatory proteins IL-6 and IL-1RA support the notion of an antiinflammatory effect of cardiorespiratory fitness. Even though exercise is linked to an acute transient inflammatory response, an abundance of studies show that exercise may exert long-term cardioprotective effects by lowering chronic inflammation [34,[47][48][49][50][51][52]. There is increasing recognition of inflammation as a key pathogenic mechanism in atherosclerosis and the development of cardiovascular disease [50,[53][54][55][56][57].…”

Estimated Cardiorespiratory Fitness Attenuates the Impacts of Sarcopenia and Obesity on Non-Alcoholic Fatty Liver in Korean Adults

“…Second, inflammation may be another explanation for the link between hepatic steatosis, sarcopenia and obesity [43,44]. As such, high CRF-related anti-inflammatory responses may attenuate the individual and synergistic impacts of sarcopenia and obesity on NAFL [11].…”

“…Obesity and cardiorespiratory fitness (CRF), which reflects the ability of the respiratory and circulatory systems to deliver oxygen to working skeletal muscles during exercise, have been well established as independent predictors of metabolic syndrome [7], diabetes [8] and CVDs [9]. The two lifestyle risk factors are also associated with NAFL [10,11]. In addition, sarcopenia is known as another novel risk factor of NAFL in Western [12,13] and Asian populations [14][15][16], collectively suggesting that an interaction among adipose tissue, skeletal muscle and the cardiorespiratory system may play an important role in the pathophysiology of NAFL [17].…”

Cardiorespiratory fitness assessed by cardiopulmonary exercise testing between different stages of pre‐dialysis chronic kidney disease: A systematic review and meta‐analysis

“…In addition, impaired cardiorespiratory fitness status is associated with increased prevalence of traditional cardiovascular risk factors, such as hypertension, diabetes and dyslipidemia 11 . Furthermore, impaired cardiorespiratory fitness has been shown to have bidirectional associations with endothelial dysfunction, 12 arterial stiffness, 6 and subclinical vascular inflammation, 13 while anaemia is an established cause of reduced exercise capacity 4 …”