Biochemical markers for cardiovascular disease in recently postmenopausal women with or without hot flashes.
OBJECTIVE
Menopausal hot flashes may affect vascular function and perhaps explain conflicting data on cardiovascular disease (CVD) between observational and randomized hormone therapy (HT) studies. We prospectively assessed hot flash status in recently postmenopausal women and related it to a number of biochemical vascular surrogate markers for CVD.


METHODS
Healthy, nonsmoking women (n = 150) exhibiting a broad range (no, mild, moderate, severe) of hot flashes and an onset of menopause within the previous 0.5 to 3 years were studied with laboratory tests for lipids, lipoproteins, apolipoproteins, high-sensitivity C-reactive protein, and sex hormone-binding globulin.


RESULTS
Apart from marked differences in hot flashes, the groups showed comparable levels of estrone, estradiol, or free estradiol index. The levels of total cholesterol (3.7-9.1 mmol/L) were similar between the groups (P = 0.744), and hypercholesterolemia (>6.5 mmol/L) was encountered equally often (P = 0.699). No difference was seen in high-, low-, or very low-density lipoproteins, triglycerides, apolipoprotein A-1, apolipoprotein B (or their ratio), or lipoprotein(a) between the groups. The levels of sex hormone-binding globulin and high-sensitivity C-reactive protein correlated negatively with each other (r = -0.204; P = 0.013) but showed no dependence on hot flashes (P = 0.531 and P = 0.215, respectively).


CONCLUSIONS
No baseline difference in lipid or nonlipid CVD risk factors was observed between women with hot flashes (potential HT users) and women with no or mild hot flashes (potential HT nonusers). This may imply that hot flash status per se cannot explain the difference between observational and randomized trials.
Tuomikoski
Pauliina
P
Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, Helsinki University Central Hospital, Helsinki, Finland.
Mikkola
Tomi S
TS
Hämäläinen
Esa
E
Tikkanen
Matti J
MJ
Turpeinen
Ursula
U
Ylikorkala
Olavi
O
D016632:Apolipoprotein A-I / Q000097:blood; D001055:Apolipoproteins B / Q000097:blood; D015415:Biomarkers / Q000097:blood; D002097:C-Reactive Protein / Q000032:analysis; D002318:Cardiovascular Diseases / Q000097:blood*; D016022:Case-Control Studies; D002784:Cholesterol / Q000097:blood; D004958:Estradiol / Q000097:blood; D004970:Estrone / Q000097:blood; D005260:Female; D019584:Hot Flashes / Q000097:blood*; D006801:Humans; D017270:Lipoprotein(a) / Q000097:blood; D008875:Middle Aged; D017698:Postmenopause / Q000097:blood*; D011446:Prospective Studies; D012720:Severity of Illness Index; D012738:Sex Hormone-Binding Globulin / Q000032:analysis
C505693:APOA1 protein, human; D016632:Apolipoprotein A-I; D001055:Apolipoproteins B; D015415:Biomarkers; D017270:Lipoprotein(a); D012738:Sex Hormone-Binding Globulin; D004970:Estrone; D004958:Estradiol; D002097:C-Reactive Protein; D002784:Cholesterol