The association of novel inflammatory marker GlycA and incident atrial fibrillation in the Multi-Ethnic Study of Atherosclerosis (MESA)

• Published in: PloS one Vol. 16; no. 3; p. e0248644
• Main Authors: Jang, Sunyoung, Ogunmoroti, Oluseye, Zhao, Di, Fashanu, Oluwaseun E, Tibuakuu, Martin, Benson, Eve-Marie, Norby, Faye, Otvos, James D, Heckbert, Susan R, Szklo, Moyses, Michos, Erin D
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: United States Public Library of Science 25.03.2021; Public Library of Science (PLoS)
• Subjects: Arrhythmia; Arteriosclerosis; Atherosclerosis; Atria; Biology and Life Sciences; Biomarkers; Cardiac arrhythmia; Cardiovascular disease; Cardiovascular diseases; Clinical trials; Congestive heart failure; Cytokines; Data collection; Dementia disorders; Diabetes; Disease prevention; Editing; Epidemiology; Ethnic factors; Exercise; Fibrillation; Funding; Health risks; Hypertension; Inflammation; Laboratories; Medicine; Medicine and Health Sciences; Methodology; NMR; Nuclear magnetic resonance; Pathogenesis; Prevention; Public health; Quality of life; Reviews; Risk factors; Substrates; Wages & salaries; United States > US; Maryland; Baltimore Maryland
• ISSN: 1932-6203; 1932-6203
• DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0248644

Emerging evidence has implicated that inflammation contributes to the pathogenesis of atrial fibrillation (AF). GlycA is a novel marker of systemic inflammation with low intra-individual variability and high analytic precision. GlycA has been associated with incident cardiovascular disease (CVD) independent of other inflammatory markers. However, whether GlycA is associated with AF, specifically, has yet to be established. We examined the association between GlycA and AF in a multi-ethnic cohort. We studied 6,602 MESA participants aged 45-85, with no clinical CVD at baseline, with data on GlycA and incident AF. We used multivariable-adjusted Cox models to evaluate the association between GlycA and incident AF. We also examined other inflammatory markers [high-sensitivity C-reactive protein (hsCRP), interleukin-6 (IL6) and fibrinogen] and incident AF for comparison. The mean (SD) age was 62 (10) years, 53% women. The mean plasma GlycA was 381 (62) μmol/L. Over median follow-up of 12.9 years, 869 participants experienced AF. There was no statistically significant association between GlycA and incident AF after adjusting for sociodemographics, CVD risk factors, and other inflammatory markers [Hazard Ratio (95% CI) per 1 SD increment in GlycA: 0.97 (0.88-1.06)]. Neither hsCRP nor fibrinogen was associated with incident AF in same model. In contrast, IL-6 was independently associated with incident AF [HR 1.12 per 1 SD increment (1.05-1.19)]. Although GlycA has been associated with other CVD types, we found that GlycA was not associated with AF. More research will be required to understand why IL-6 was associated with AF but not GlycA. MESA is not a clinical trial. However, the cohort is registered at: URL: https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT00005487 Unique identifier: NCT00005487.