Visceral adipose tissue area and proportion provide distinct reflections of cardiometabolic outcomes in weight loss; pooled analysis of MRI-assessed CENTRAL and DIRECT PLUS dietary randomized controlled trials

Table 1 Sex-specific baseline characteristics of the CENTRAL and DIRECT PLUS clinical trials participants

Characteristic¹	N	Overall, N = 572²	Male, N = 506²	Female, N = 66²	p value³	q-value⁴
Age	572	49.5 ± 10.1	49.3 ± 10.1	51.1 ± 10.1	0.17	0.23
Weight, kg	572	92.6 ± 13.9	94.3 ± 13.1	79.4 ± 13.0	< 0.001	< 0.001
BMI, kg/m²	572	30.9 ± 3.9	30.9 ± 3.7	31.0 ± 5.2	0.87	0.87
Waist circumference, cm	571	108.2 ± 9.7	109.1 ± 9.1	101.4 ± 11.0	< 0.001	< 0.001
Diabetes	568	62 (10.9)	58 (11.5)	4 (6.2)	0.19	0.23
Metabolic syndrome	559	350 (62.6)	321 (65.0)	29 (44.6)	0.002	0.003
SSAT area, cm²	553	119.7 (91.5–162.9)	113.6 (87.9–151.9)	197.0 (159.0–256.2)	< 0.001	< 0.001
DSAT area, cm²	560	228.2 (179.9–290.2)	228.5 (178.5–293.9)	227.3 (187.4–268.4)	0.69	0.77
VAT area, cm²	564	134.8 (103.2–174.3)	139.3 (108.2–178.1)	105.4 (77.8–138.4)	< 0.001	< 0.001
VAT proportion, %	553	28.2 ± 9.0	29.3 ± 8.7	19.8 ± 6.7	< 0.001	< 0.001
VAT/SAT	553	0.4 (0.3–0.5)	0.4 (0.3–0.5)	0.2 (0.2–0.3)	< 0.001	< 0.001

¹BMI Body mass index, SSAT Superficial subcutaneous adipose tissue, DSAT Deep subcutaneous adipose tissue, VAT Visceral adipose tissue, SAT Subcutaneous adipose tissue
²Values are presented as either the median (p25, p75) or the mean ± standard deviation for continuous variables, depending on their distribution, or as a number (%) for categorical variables
³Two sample t-test; Pearson’s chi-squared test; Wilcoxon rank sum test
⁴False discovery rate correction for multiple testing

ISSN: 1741-7015