Associations between weight change and biomarkers of cardiometabolic risk in South Asians: secondary analyses of the PODOSA Trial

Background/Objectives: The association of weight changes with cardiometabolic biomarkers in South Asians has been sparsely studied.\ud Subjects/Methods: We measured cardiometabolic biomarkers at baseline and after 3 years in the Prevention of Diabetes and Obesity in South Asians Trial. We investigated the effect of a lifestyle intervention on biomarkers in the randomized groups. In addition, treating the population as a single cohort, we estimated the association between change in weight and change in biomarkers.\ud Results: Complete data were available at baseline and after 3 years in 151 participants. At 3 years, there was an adjusted mean reduction of 1·44 kg (95% confidence interval (95% CI): 0.18–2.71) in weight and 1.59 cm (95% CI: 0.08–3.09) in waist circumference in the intervention arm as compared with the control arm. There was no clear evidence of difference between the intervention and control arms in change of mean value of any biomarker. As a single cohort, every 1 kg weight reduction during follow-up was associated with a reduction in triglycerides (−1.3%, P=0.048), alanine aminotransferase (−2.5%, P=0.032), gamma-glutamyl transferase (−2.2%, P=0.040), leptin (−6.5%, P