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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Nutr.
Sec. Clinical Nutrition
Volume 11 - 2024 | doi: 10.3389/fnut.2024.1432973

Association between body fat distribution and asthma in adults: results from the cross-sectional and bidirectional Mendelian randomization study

Provisionally accepted
  • 1 Department of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine, The First Affiliated Hospital of Army Medical University, Chongqing, China
  • 2 Public Health and Clinical Center of Chengdu, Chengdu, Sichuan Province, China
  • 3 Department of Ultrasound, The Second Affiliated Hospital of Army Medical University, Chongqing, China

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

    Background: Many studies define obesity based on body mass index (BMI) and explore its relationship with adult asthma. However, BMI only considers height and weight, ignoring other factors such as body fat, which may have a greater impact on health. We investigated the relationship between body fat distribution and adult asthma using both a cross-sectional study and bidirectional Mendelian randomization (MR) analysis. Methods: Weighted logistic regression models were used to examine the relationship between body fat distribution measurements and adult asthma in the cross-sectional study from National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) 2011–2018. Restricted cubic spline (RCS) curves were employed to explore the dose-response relationship between them. The inverse-variance weighted (IVW) method was used as the main method of MR analysis to explore the causal effect of exposure on outcome. Results: After adjusting for all covariates, weighted logistic regression analysis indicated that fat mass in the left arm, left leg, right arm, right leg, trunk, and total body is associated with an increased risk of developing adult asthma (P < 0.05). RCS curves showed that all six fat mass indicators exhibit a J-shaped relationship with adult asthma. Forward MR analysis found a causal effect of six fat mass indicators on the increased risk of adult asthma (P < 0.05). However, reverse MR did not reveal any causal effect of adult asthma on these six fat mass indicators (P > 0.05). Conclusion: Our study supports a positive correlation and a unidirectional causality between body fat distribution measurements and the risk of adult asthma. Further studies are needed to validate our findings.

    Keywords: Body Fat Distribution, Adult asthma, Cross-sectional study, Mendelian randomization, fat mass

    Received: 15 May 2024; Accepted: 12 Jul 2024.

    Copyright: © 2024 Wang, Chen, Wei, He and Gong. 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:
    Zhengxiao Wei, Public Health and Clinical Center of Chengdu, Chengdu, 610061, Sichuan Province, China
    Liang Gong, Department of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine, The First Affiliated Hospital of Army Medical University, Chongqing, China

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