Your new experience awaits. Try the new design now and help us make it even better

ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Endocrinol.

Sec. Obesity

Volume 16 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fendo.2025.1576599

Visceral Adiposity Loss is Associated with Improvement in Cardiometabolic Markers: Findings from a Dietary Intervention Study

Provisionally accepted
Shazana Rifham  AbdullahShazana Rifham Abdullah1*Ahmad Kamil  Nur Zati IwaniAhmad Kamil Nur Zati Iwani1Liyana  Ahmad ZamriLiyana Ahmad Zamri1Ruziana Mona  Wan Mohd ZinRuziana Mona Wan Mohd Zin1Norhashimah  Abu SemanNorhashimah Abu Seman1Nur Azlin  Zainal AbidinNur Azlin Zainal Abidin1Siti Sarah  HamzahSiti Sarah Hamzah1Nur Hayati  AzizulNur Hayati Azizul1Azahadi  OmarAzahadi Omar2Zamtira  SemanZamtira Seman2Abqariyah  YahyaAbqariyah Yahya3Mohd Fairulnizal  Md NohMohd Fairulnizal Md Noh1
  • 1Nutrition, Metabolism and Cardiovascular Research Centre, Institute for Medical Research, National Institutes of Health, Ministry of Health Malaysia, Selangor, Malaysia
  • 2Sector for Biostatistics and Data Repository, National Institutes of Health, Ministry of Health Malaysia, Selangor, Malaysia
  • 3Department of Social and Preventive Medicine, Faculty of Medicine, Universiti Malaya, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

Background: Visceral adiposity is closely linked with cardiometabolic disorders, but evidence on the extent of visceral fat loss required for significant improvement in cardiometabolic markers remains limited. This study aims to investigate the association between visceral fat area (VFA) reductions and improvements in cardiometabolic markers following a 3-month dietary intervention.Methods: A total of 175 adults with overweight and obesity were involved in this non-randomized controlled trial. Data on sociodemographic, anthropometric, body composition and biochemistry were collected at baseline and after 3 months of intervention. The multiple logistic regression analysis was conducted to determine the association between VFA loss (no loss, < 5% loss, and ≥ 5% loss) and improvement in cardiometabolic markers. For each cardiometabolic marker, an improvement surpassing the minimum threshold of the third tertile was classified as a good improvement.Results: Compared to those with no VFA loss, participants with VFA loss of ≥ 5% were significantly associated with a higher improvement in waist circumference (OR 2.97,), highdensity lipoprotein cholesterol (HDL-C) (OR 4.19,, triglycerides (OR 3.01, 95% CI 1.14-7.92), and glycated hemoglobin (HbA1C) (OR 2.95, 95% CI 1.12-7.79). Other than that, those with < 5% VFA loss were 3.6 times more likely to have a higher improvement in HDL-C compared to those with no VFA loss (OR 4.08,. Conclusion: This study found that the magnitude of VFA loss is an independent determinant of improvements in cardiometabolic markers and should be set as a clear target when designing obesity prevention programs.

Keywords: visceral fat area, visceral adiposity, Cardiometabolic markers, Lipid profiles, Insulin Resistance, intermittent fasting

Received: 10 Mar 2025; Accepted: 12 May 2025.

Copyright: © 2025 Abdullah, Nur Zati Iwani, Ahmad Zamri, Wan Mohd Zin, Abu Seman, Zainal Abidin, Hamzah, Azizul, Omar, Seman, Yahya and Md Noh. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

* Correspondence: Shazana Rifham Abdullah, Nutrition, Metabolism and Cardiovascular Research Centre, Institute for Medical Research, National Institutes of Health, Ministry of Health Malaysia, Selangor, Malaysia

Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.