High-Density Lipoprotein Cholesterol and All-Cause and Cause-Specific Mortality Among the Elderly

CONTEXT: The patterns of the association between high-density lipoprotein cholesterol (HDL-C) concentrations and mortality among the elderly are still unclear. OBJECTIVE: To examine the association of HDL-C concentrations with mortality and to identify the optimal HDL-C concentration range that predicts the lowest risk of all-cause mortality among the elderly. DESIGN: This was a nationwide, community-based, prospective cohort study. PARTICIPANTS: This study included 7766 elderly individuals (aged ≥65 years; mean age: 74.4 years) from the Health and Retirement Study. Cox proportional hazards models and Cox models with penalized smoothing splines were used to estimate hazard ratios (HRs) with 95% CI for all-cause and cause-specific mortality. RESULTS: During a median follow-up of 5.9 years, 1921 deaths occurred. After a full adjustment for covariates, a nonlinear (P 87 mg/dL (2.25 mM; HR: 1.56; 95% CI: 1.17 to 2.07) than in the group with HDL-C concentrations ranging from 61 to 87 mg/dL (1.58 to 2.25 mM). Nonlinear associations of HDL-C concentrations with both cardiovascular and noncardiovascular mortality were also observed (both P < 0.001 for nonlinearity). CONCLUSIONS: Among the elderly, nonlinear associations were found between HDL-C and all-cause and cardiovascular mortality. The single optimal HDL-C concentration and range were 71 mg/dL and 61 to 87 mg/dL, respectively.