Background: Studies showed that the endotoxemia-related biomarker, lipopolysaccharide-binding protein (LBP), is associated with obesity and fatty liver. The level of LBP is reduced after surgical weight loss. This study aimed to verify the change of serum LBP levels after one-year medical weight management in subjects with obesity.
Methods and findings: A total of 62 subjects with obesity, 39 subjects with overweight, and 21 subjects with normal body mass index were enrolled for a one-year weight management program. Basic information, body composition analysis, clinical data, serum LBP level, and abdominal ultrasonography findings were collected. At baseline, the serum LBP levels of the obese and overweight subjects were significantly higher than that of the normal group (30.9±7.4 and 29.6±6.3 versus 23.1±5.6 μg/mL, respectively, p<0.001). Serum LBP in subjects with obesity was significantly reduced to 26.5±7.1 μg/mL (p-value < 0.001) after one year. In the multivariate analyses, LBP was associated with high sensitive C-reactive protein (hs-CRP) and non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) fibrosis score (NFS) before weight management in the obese group. Moreover, the change of LBP in response to weight management was significantly related to the changes of hs-CRP, leukocyte count and NFS by multivariate linear regression analysis also in the obese group.
Conclusion: The serum level of the endotoxemia-related biomarker, LBP, decreases after one-year weight management in the obese subjects. In addition to serving as a metainflammatroy biomarker like hs-CRP, LBP may also be a potential biomarker as a non-invasive biomarker for the evaluation of liver fibrosis in NAFLD.