title: Did Dumbo suffer a heart attack? independent association between earlobe crease and cardiovascular disease.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Earlobe crease (ELC) has been associated with cardiovascular diseases (CVD) or risk factors (CVRF) and could be a marker predisposing to CVD. However, most studies studied only a small number of CVRF and no complete assessment of the associations between ELC and CVRF has been performed in a single study.
  
  
  METHODS
  Population-based study (n = 4635, 46.7% men) conducted between 2009 and 2012 in Lausanne, Switzerland.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Eight hundred six participants (17.4%) had an ELC. Presence of ELC was associated with male gender and older age. After adjusting for age and gender (and medication whenever necessary), presence of ELC was significantly (p < 0.05) associated with higher levels of body mass index (BMI) [adjusted mean ± standard error: 27.0 ± 0.2 vs. 26.02 ± 0.07 kg/m(2)], triglycerides [1.40 ± 0.03 vs. 1.36 ± 0.01 mmol/L] and insulin [8.8 ± 0.2 vs. 8.3 ± 0.1 μIU/mL]; lower levels of HDL cholesterol [1.61 ± 0.02 vs. 1.64 ± 0.01 mmol/L]; higher frequency of abdominal obesity [odds ratio and (95% confidence interval) 1.20 (1.02; 1.42)]; hypertension [1.41 (1.18; 1.67)]; diabetes [1.43 (1.15; 1.79)]; high HOMA-IR [1.19 (1.00; 1.42)]; metabolic syndrome [1.28 (1.08; 1.51)] and history of CVD [1.55 (1.21; 1.98)]. No associations were found between ELC and estimated cardiovascular risk, inflammatory or liver markers. After further adjustment on BMI, only the associations between ELC and hypertension [1.30 (1.08; 1.56)] and history of CVD [1.47 (1.14; 1.89)] remained significant. For history of CVD, further adjustment on diabetes, hypertension, total cholesterol and smoking led to similar results [1.36 (1.05; 1.77)].
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  In this community-based sample ELC was significantly and independently associated with hypertension and history of CVD.
authors.affiliation: Faculty of Medicine, University of Lausanne, Lausanne, Switzerland. Marta.Aligisakis@unil.ch.|Department of Internal Medicine, Lausanne University Hospital (CHUV), Rue du Bugnon 46, 1011, Lausanne, Switzerland. Marta.Aligisakis@unil.ch.
authors.forename: Marta
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Aligisakis
authors.affiliation: Department of Internal Medicine, Lausanne University Hospital (CHUV), Rue du Bugnon 46, 1011, Lausanne, Switzerland. Pedro-Manuel.Marques-Vidal@chuv.ch.
authors.forename: Pedro
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Marques-Vidal
authors.affiliation: Institute of Social and Preventive Medicine (IUMSP), Lausanne University Hospital, Lausanne, Switzerland. Idris.Guessous@hcuge.ch.|Department of Community Medicine, Primary Care and Emergency Medicine, Geneva University Hospitals, Geneva, Switzerland. Idris.Guessous@hcuge.ch.
authors.forename: Idris
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Guessous
authors.affiliation: Department of Internal Medicine, Lausanne University Hospital (CHUV), Rue du Bugnon 46, 1011, Lausanne, Switzerland. Peter.Vollenweider@chuv.ch.
authors.forename: Peter
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Vollenweider
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000367:Age Factors; D000368:Aged; D015992:Body Mass Index; D002318:Cardiovascular Diseases / Q000097:blood / Q000453:epidemiology; D008076:Cholesterol, HDL / Q000097:blood; D015331:Cohort Studies; D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D003920:Diabetes Mellitus / Q000097:blood / Q000453:epidemiology*; D054644:Ear Auricle / Q000033:anatomy & histology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D006973:Hypertension / Q000453:epidemiology*; D007328:Insulin / Q000097:blood; D007333:Insulin Resistance; D008297:Male; D024821:Metabolic Syndrome / Q000097:blood / Q000453:epidemiology*; D008875:Middle Aged; D056128:Obesity, Abdominal / Q000453:epidemiology*; D011446:Prospective Studies; D012737:Sex Factors; D013557:Switzerland / Q000453:epidemiology; D014280:Triglycerides / Q000097:blood
chemical_list: D008076:Cholesterol, HDL; D007328:Insulin; D014280:Triglycerides