Linoleic Acid in Adipose Tissue and Development of Ischemic Stroke: A Danish Case-Cohort Study

BACKGROUND: We investigated the association between the content of linoleic acid in adipose tissue, a biomarker of long-term intake of linoleic acid, and the risk of ischemic stroke and its subtypes.

METHODS AND RESULTS: The Danish cohort study Diet, Cancer and Health included 57 053 patients aged 50 to 65 years at enrollment. All participants had an adipose tissue biopsy performed at enrollment, while information on ischemic stroke during follow-up was obtained from the Danish National Patient Register. Stroke diagnoses were all validated and classified according to the Trial of Org 10172 in Acute Stroke Treatment (TOAST) classification. Cases and a randomly drawn subcohort of 3500 patients had their fatty acid composition in adipose tissue determined by gas chromatography. Hazard ratios with 95% confidence intervals were calculated using weighted Cox proportional hazard regression. During 13.5 years of follow-up, 1879 ischemic stroke cases were identified, for which 1755 adipose biopsies were available, while adipose biopsies were available for 3203 participants in the subcohort. When comparing the highest and the lowest quartiles of adipose tissue content of linoleic acid there was a negative association with the rate of total ischemic stroke (hazard ratio, 0.78; 95% confidence interval, 0.65-0.93) and large artery atherosclerosis (hazard ratio, 0.61; 95% confidence interval, 0.43-0.88), while there was an indication of a negative association with small-vessel occlusion (hazard ratio, 0.87; 95% confidence interval, 0.69-1.11). There was no clear association with the rate of cardioembolism.

CONCLUSIONS: The content of linoleic acid in adipose tissue was inversely associated with the risk of total ischemic stroke and stroke caused by large artery atherosclerosis.