Increased serum visfatin in patients with metabolic syndrome and carotid atherosclerosis

Visfatin is a newly identified adipocytokine and recent studies indicated that visfatin may have potential proinflammatory effect. However, its pathophysiological role in the metabolic syndrome (MetS) is not fully understood. In this study we investigated whether serum visfatin levels is altered in patients with the MetS, and compared the levels of visfatin between patients with and without carotid plaques. A total of 139 patients with MetS and 105 controls were included. The patients were further divided into two groups: 40 with carotid plaques and 99 without carotid plaques. Serum visfatin was measured by using enzyme immunoassay method and carotid intimal-media thickness (IMT) was measured by ultrasound in all subjects. Serum visfatin was elevated in both MetS patients with and without carotid plaques compared to controls (log visfatin: 1.14 +/- 0.14 vs. 0.99 +/- 0.17 ng/ml vs. 0.93 +/- 0.23 ng/ml, P < 0.001 and P < 0.05 vs. control group, respectively), and in patients with carotid plaques more than in patients without carotid plaques (P < 0.001). Multiple stepwise regression analysis revealed that only LDL-cholesterol correlated with visfatin, and visfatin independently correlated with max IMT in the patients with MetS. A log visfatin > 1.08 ng/ml had 70% sensitivity and 67% specificity for detecting patients with carotid plaques. Our results showed that serum visfatin was increased in patients with MetS, especially in those with carotid plaques. Visfatin may be an inflammatory marker of MetS.