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Updated: Oct 27, 2025

Assessment of Human Adipose Tissue Microvascular Function Using Videomicroscopy
Published on: September 29, 2017
Biomarker-based visceral adiposity score and incident type 2 diabetes in the multiethnic cohort
Gertraud Maskarinec1, Phyllis Ash Raquinio1, Veronica W Setiawan2
1University of Hawaii Cancer Center, Honolulu, HI.
Purpose:
Visceral adipose tissue (VAT) may be more important than subcutaneous fat in type 2 diabetes (T2D) etiology. We examined a VAT score developed in reference to MRI measurement of VAT in the Multiethnic Cohort (MEC) as a risk factor for incident T2D.
Methods:
Two nested case-control studies of cancer allowed calculation of the VAT score based on anthropometric measures and 8 biomarkers among 2,556 participants without T2D. Incident cases were identified from Medicare linkages and self-reports after blood draws in 2001-2006. Cox regression with age as time metric was applied to estimate the association of the VAT score with T2D.
Results:
During 10.1 ± 2.4 years, 355 incident T2D cases were identified. VAT scores were higher in T2D cases than among those without disease (5.06±0.43 vs. 4.95±0.41; P<0.0001) and significantly associated with T2D (HR = 2.70; 95%CI 1.60, 4.58 per unit) with similar values in men (HR = 2.99; 95%CI 1.03, 8.73) and women (HR = 2.61; 95%CI 1.39, 4.91). A significant association was observed in all five ethnic groups but only statistically significant among Japanese Americans (HR = 6.24; 95%CI 2.34, 16.68).
Conclusion:
These findings support that VAT as estimated by a biomarker-based score predicts T2D incidence beyond BMI in particular among older adults of Japanese ancestry.
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