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Visceral adiposity is considered to have a key role in cardiometabolic diseases. The purpose of this study is to investigate cross-sectionally the association between intra-abdominal fat area (IAFA) measured by computed tomography (CT) and high blood pressure independent of abdominal subcutaneous fat area (ASFA) and insulin resistance. Study participants included 624 Japanese men not taking oral hypoglycemic medications or insulin. Abdominal, thoracic and thigh fat areas were measured by CT. Total fat area (TFA) was calculated as the sum of abdominal, thoracic and thigh fat area. Total subcutaneous fat area (TSFA) was defined as TFA minus IAFA. Hypertension and high normal blood pressure were defined using the 1999 criteria of the World Health Organization. Multiple-adjusted odds ratios of hypertension for tertiles of IAFA were 2.64 (95% confidence interval, 1.35-5.16) for tertile 2, and 5.08 (2.48-10.39) for tertile 3, compared with tertile 1 after adjusting for age, fasting immunoreactive insulin, diabetes status, ASFA, alcohol consumption, regular physical exercise and smoking habit. IAFA remained significantly associated with hypertension even after adjustment for ASFA, TSFA, TFA, body mass index or waist circumference, and no other measure of regional or total adiposity was associated with the odds of hypertension in models, which included IAFA. Similar results were obtained for the association between IAFA and the prevalence of high normal blood pressure or hypertension. In conclusion, greater visceral adiposity was associated with a higher odds of high blood pressure in Japanese men.

It is unclear which blood pressure (BP) components (that is, systolic BP (SBP), diastolic BP (DBP), pulse pressure (PP) and mean arterial pressure (MAP)) are superior predictors of chronic kidney disease (CKD). Furthermore it is unclear whether the combination of SBP+DBP or PP+MAP is superior to any of these four individual BP components in predicting CKD. We enrolled 9928 Japanese men aged 40-55 years who had a normal estimated glomerular filtration rate (eGFR), no proteinuria and no history of cardiovascular disease and were not taking any antihypertensive medications at baseline. CKD was defined as an eGFR of <60 ml min(-1) per 1.73 m(2) using the modified diet in renal disease equation. ΔAkaike's information criterion (ΔAIC) was used to compare the BP components-added model to the model without them in a Cox proportional hazards model. During the 52 428 person-years of follow-up, there were 434 cases of CKD. Of all four BP components, the model including DBP- or MAP-alone had the highest values of ΔAIC (10.2 and 9.85, respectively). The PP-alone model had the lowest ΔAIC value (-1.48). The combination models including SBP+DBP (ΔAIC 8.42) or PP+MAP (8.42) were not superior to the models including DBP- or MAP-alone. These findings suggested that, of the four BP components, both DBP and MAP were the most useful predictors for subsequent incidence of CKD, but PP was not an important predictor. The combination model, including SBP+DBP or PP+MAP, was not superior to the models including DBP- or MAP-alone for predicting CKD.