Early heart disease common in obese PCOS patients
Source: Journal of Clinical Endocrinology and Metabolism 2007; Advance online publication
Assessing traditional cardiovascular risk factors and coronary artery calcification in obese young women with polycystic ovary syndrome.
MedWire News: Subclinical coronary atherosclerosis is present in one-third of young obese women with polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS), a case-control study has found.
The results underscore the need for screening and aggressive intervention among these women in order to lower the risk of cardiovascular (CV) events, say the investigators.
Rupal Shroff and team from the University of Iowa, USA, studied 24 women with PCOS and 24 controls matched for age and weight. All participants had a body mass index of at least 30 kg/m2.
The two groups were similar with respect to traditional CV risk factors (age, smoking, diabetes, history of CV disease, hypertension, and dyslipidemia), inflammatory markers, adiponectin levels, body fat distribution, and metabolic parameters.
However, PCOS patients were 5.5 times more likely to have coronary artery calcification than were controls (33 percent vs percent) and also displayed significantly lower insulin resistance as determined by the QUICKI index.
Shroff and co-authors say their study indicates that asymptomatic women with PCOS may have subclinical coronary disease even in the absence of other traditional CV risk factors.
"All obese women with PCOS should be counseled and treated for CV risk factor modification," they conclude.
Posted: 14 September 2007
http://www.orgyn.com/en/news/2007/We...93443427893519
Early heart disease common in obese PCOS patients 
