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Association between the Metabolic Syndrome and Serum Cortisol in Overweight Latino Youth

Departments of Pediatrics, Preventive Medicine, and Physiology and Biophysics, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, California 90089

Address all correspondence and requests for reprints to: Marc J. Weigensberg, M.D., Department of Pediatrics, University of Southern California, 2250 Alcazar Street, CSC 200, Los Angeles, California 90089-9073. E-mail: weigensb{at}usc.edu.

Objective: The purpose of this report is to investigate the associations between metabolic syndrome (MS) and levels of morning serum cortisol in a cohort of overweight Latino youth.

Design: Subjects were 205 overweight, Latino youth (age 8–13 yr, body mass index percentile > 85, family history positive for type 2 diabetes). Measures included body composition by dual-energy x-ray absorptiometry, intraabdominal adipose tissue (IAAT) by magnetic resonance imaging, insulin sensitivity by frequently sampled iv glucose tolerance test/minimal model, fasting lipids, and serum cortisol.

Results: Children with MS had higher body mass index percentile, total body fat mass, and IAAT and lower insulin sensitivity than those without MS. Children with MS had higher morning serum cortisol levels, whether unadjusted (10.1 ± 3.7 vs. 9.0 ± 2.8 µg/dl, P < 0.05) or after adjusting for age, gender, total body fat and lean tissue mass, and insulin sensitivity (10.4 ± 0.4 vs. 8.9 ± 0.3 µg/dl, P < 0.01). Increasing number of features of MS was associated with higher cortisol levels, after adjusting for covariates (P = 0.001). Among individual features of MS, systolic blood pressure had the strongest relationship with adjusted cortisol level (r = 0.34; P < 0.001), followed by diastolic blood pressure and fasting plasma glucose (both r = 0.23; P < 0.01). IAAT was associated with cortisol (r = 0.16; P < 0.05), whereas high-density lipoprotein, triglycerides, and waist circumference were not.

Conclusions: In overweight, Latino youth, MS is associated with higher morning serum cortisol levels, independent of body fat and insulin sensitivity. More studies are needed to investigate the role of relative hypercortisolism and chronic stress in obesity-related metabolic disorders in children.

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