Associations of Insulin Levels With Left Ventricular Structure and Function in American Indians

We evaluated the association of insulin and echocardiographic left ventricular (LV) measurements in 1,388 (45% men) nondiabetic American Indian participants in the Strong Heart Study (SHS). Significant (all P < 0.05) relations were found in men and women between log(10) fasting insulin and LV mass (r = 0.24 and 0.26), left atrial diameter (r = 0.25 and 0.28), posterior wall thickness (r = 0.20 and 0.26), septal thickness (r = 0.19 and 0.24), LV diameter (r = 0.17 and 0.16), and cardiac output (r = 0.20 and 0.24) and in women relative wall thickness (r = 0.11) and peripheral resistance (r = -0.17). In regression analyses, adjusting for BMI, age, height, and systolic pressure, fasting insulin was independently correlated with cardiac output in men and relative wall thickness and septal thickness in women (all P < 0.05). The 97th percentiles of fasting insulin (25 microU/ml for men, and 23 microU/ml for women) in 163 apparently normal (BMI <26; blood pressure <140/90; and absence of diabetes, valvular disease, LV wall motion abnormality, or antihypertensive treatment) SHS participants were used to separate normal from elevated fasting insulin levels. Adjusting for age, BMI, and height, men with elevated insulin levels had larger LV diameters (5.41 vs. 5.16 cm; P = 0.05), higher cardiac output (5.5 vs. 4.9 l/min; P < 0.001), and lower peripheral resistance (1,487 vs. 1,666; P = 0.01), paralleling results of regression analyses. Positive relations between insulin and heart size in nondiabetic adults are largely due to associations with body size; after adjustments for covariates, fasting insulin levels are related to greater LV size and cardiac output in men and more concentric LV geometry in women.