Cardiovascular diseases are the leading cause of mortality worldwide. Since atherosclerosis, an inflammatory, lipid-driven disease, is an underlying basis for the development of cardiovascular disease, it is important to understand its relationship with confounding factors, such as oxidative lipid degradation. In contrast, circulating antioxidants prevent oxidative lipid damage, and therefore, may be associated with reduced development of atherosclerosis. We aimed to assess oxidative lipid degradation biomarker malondialdehyde (MDA) and antioxidant defense system components, total antioxidant capacity (TAC) and superoxide dismutase (SOD) inhibition rate levels, in healthy women and evaluate their relationships with age, anthropometric measures, and lipid metabolism biomarkers. The study included 86 healthy middle-aged women. MDA in human serum samples was evaluated by HPLC, and the TAC and SOD inhibition rates were measured by photometric methods. MDA was found to be associated with age, total cholesterol, non-HDL cholesterol, apolipoprotein B and triacylglycerols. TAC was shown to be associated with age, BMI, and waist circumference, as well as lipid metabolism biomarkers apolipoprotein B and triacylglycerol, while SOD inhibition rate was only associated with total cholesterol, apolipoprotein B and triacylglycerols. In conclusion, the association of oxidative status indices, MDA, TAC and SOD, with cardiovascular risk factors suggests that they could be additional useful biomarkers in the research of aging, obesity, and atherosclerosis pathogenesis.
Keywords: antioxidants; lipid metabolism markers; lipid peroxidation; malondialdehyde; oxidative stress.