Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2021 Mar 21;13(3):1014.
doi: 10.3390/nu13031014.

Associations between Circulating Markers of Cholesterol Homeostasis and Macrovascular Events among Patients Undergoing Hemodialysis

Wen-Chin Lee  1 , Wei-Hung Kuo  1 , Sin-Hua Moi  2 , Barry Chiu  3 , Jin-Bor Chen  1 , Cheng-Hong Yang  4   5
Affiliations

Associations between Circulating Markers of Cholesterol Homeostasis and Macrovascular Events among Patients Undergoing Hemodialysis

Wen-Chin Lee et al. Nutrients. .

Abstract

Current strategies targeting serum cholesterol bring limited benefits to mortality and macrovascular events prevention among hemodialysis patients. Direct measurements and analysis on circulating markers of cholesterol homeostasis could be promising solutions to this bottleneck. We prospectively enrolled 90 maintenance hemodialysis patients and 9 healthy controls in 2019 for 1 year. We measured circulating desmosterol and lathosterol as markers for cholesterol synthesis and campesterol and sitosterol for cholesterol absorption. At baseline, hemodialysis patients showed higher levels of campesterol (p = 0.023) compared to healthy controls. During follow-up, we identified 14 (15.4%) patients who experienced macrovascular events. Comparisons of cholesterol homeostasis markers between cohorts with and without macrovascular events showed no significant differences in markers of cholesterol synthesis or absorption. Using logistic regression analysis, the odds ratio was not statistically significant for the prediction of macrovascular events after full-adjusting for age, sex, diabetes, serum albumin, cholesterol, and triglyceride. We concluded that hemodialysis patients demonstrated higher level of cholesterols absorption, indicated by circulating campesterol compared to healthy subjects. Markers for cholesterol homeostasis were not significantly associated with macrovascular events during a 1-year follow-up. Our results shed light on the novel therapeutic target of modulating cholesterol absorption in HD patients.

Keywords: cholesterol homeostasis; hemodialysis; macrovascular events; mortality.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no conflict of interest. The funders had no role in the design of the study; in the collection, analyses, or interpretation of data; in the writing of the manuscript, or in the decision to publish the results.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Study design and flowchart of patient selection.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

References

    1. Hou F., Jiang J., Chen J., Yu X., Zhou Q., Chen P., Mei C., Xiong F., Shi W., Zhou W., et al. China collaborative study on dialysis: A multi-centers cohort study on cardiovascular diseases in patients on maintenance dialysis. BMC Nephrol. 2012;13:94. doi: 10.1186/1471-2369-13-94. - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Wang H.H., Hung S.Y., Sung J.M., Hung K.Y., Wang J.D. Risk of stroke in long-term dialysis patients compared with the general population. Am. J. Kidney Dis. 2014;63:604–611. doi: 10.1053/j.ajkd.2013.10.013. - DOI - PubMed
    1. Lee W.-C., Lee Y.-T., Li L.-C., Ng H.-Y., Kuo W.-H., Lin P.-T., Liao Y.-C., Chiou T.T.-Y., Lee C.-T. The Number of Comorbidities Predicts Renal Outcomes in Patients with Stage 3–5 Chronic Kidney Disease. J. Clin. Med. 2018;7:493. doi: 10.3390/jcm7120493. - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. De Jager D.J., Grootendorst D.C., Jager K.J., Van Dijk P.C., Tomas L.M.J., Ansell D., Collart F., Finne P., Heaf J.G., De Meester J., et al. Cardiovascular and Noncardiovascular Mortality Among Patients Starting Dialysis. JAMA. 2009;302:1782–1789. doi: 10.1001/jama.2009.1488. - DOI - PubMed
    1. United States Renal Data System . 2020 USRDS Annual Data Report: Epidemiology of Kidney Disease in the United States. National Institutes of Health, National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases; Bethesda, MD, USA: 2020.

LinkOut - more resources