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Possible new treatment for metabolic syndrome

Updated: 2009-06-11 20:39:25 CST Category: Advanced Lipid Treatment I

by Laurent Castellucci

Researchers have found that angiotensin 1-7, a natural hormone in the body, shows evidence of improving the metabolic syndrome in rats, possibly opening the door for a potential treatment of the condition.

"No specific form of medical therapy for the metabolic syndrome presently exists," said Dr Yoint Marcus of the Weizmann Institute of Science in Rehovot, Israel and lead author of the study. "But an estimated 20 to 25 percent of the world's adult population has the metabolic syndrome."

The metabolic syndrome is a cluster of risk factors that increase the chance of developing heart disease, stroke and diabetes. The syndrome requires having any three of the following characteristics: increased waist circumference, low HDL cholesterol, high triglycerides, high blood pressure and high blood glucose. All of the factors are easily determined by a blood test or a waist measurement.

Overactive angiotensin II is known to contribute to developing the metabolic syndrome, and angiotensin 1-7 was known to counteract some of angiotensin II's effects. Marcus and his colleagues examined the effect of angiotensin 1-7 in rats that already had metabolic syndrome and found that it helped reduce many of the blood test scores, which might be enough to push someone from having the syndrome to not.

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