title: No significant effect of acute moderate alcohol intake on leptin levels in healthy male volunteers.
abstract: As, for ethical reasons, it is difficult to investigate by an experiment the effect of acute intoxication on leptin levels in alcoholics, we tested the hypothesis of lowered levels as an effect of acute ethanol intake in healthy volunteers. The subjects comprised (1) 17 healthy male participants, recruited via newspaper advertisements [age 29+/-3.75 years, body mass index (BMI) 24.3+/-3.5, leptin at baseline 3.3+/-3.1 ng/ml]; (2) for comparison, leptin levels of 16 male alcoholic patients at day 1 of withdrawal were used. They were characterized as follows: (mean, median, standard deviation and range) age in years (41.1, 40.5, 10.2, 24, 57), BMI (23.3, 21.7, 5.4, 16.6, 37.5), 1,032 g of ethanol (median) consumed within the last 7 days, leptin levels 2.3 mg/ml. A placebo-controlled double-blind trial was performed. Leptin levels of blood samples were taken at baseline (t(1)), before ethanol intake (t(2)), when blood alcohol had reached its maximum (t(3)) and the morning after (t(4)). The oral dose of ethanol administered was 0.6 g/kg ethanol. (1) VOLUNTEERS: (a) the ethanol and placebo group exhibited leptin levels corresponding closely with levels measured at baseline (t(1)) (rs=0.85, p<0.0001) and follow-up (t(4)) (rs=0.768, p<0.0001). (b) Leptin levels for the placebo and the alcohol-consuming (verum) group did not differ significantly at baseline, after ethanol intake or on the morning after [Mann-Whitney U-test (p=0.669, p=1.0 and p=0.887, respectively)]. (2) Leptin levels in relation to BMI did not significantly differ at any measurement time in either group. (3) Leptin levels/BMI of the healthy volunteers at t(1) and t(4) were not significantly different from those of 16 alcoholics. The data do not support the hypothesis of a significant effect of acute moderate alcohol intake on leptin levels in healthy volunteers.
authors.affiliation: Psychiatric University Clinic, Basel, Switzerland.
authors.forename: Gerhard
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Dammann
authors.forename: Jutta
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Dierkes
authors.forename: Marc
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Graf
authors.forename: Gerhard A
authors.initials: GA
authors.lastname: Wiesbeck
authors.forename: Lutz
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Pridzun
authors.forename: Tilman
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Schulte
authors.forename: Sabine
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Westphal
authors.forename: Claus
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Luley
authors.forename: John P
authors.initials: JP
authors.lastname: Allen
authors.forename: Friedrich Martin
authors.initials: FM
authors.lastname: Wurst
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000428:Alcohol Drinking / Q000097:blood*; D000435:Alcoholic Intoxication / Q000097:blood*; D015992:Body Mass Index; D004311:Double-Blind Method; D006801:Humans; D020738:Leptin / Q000097:blood*; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D016032:Randomized Controlled Trials as Topic; D012016:Reference Values
chemical_list: D020738:Leptin