Serum triglycerides as a risk factor for cardiovascular diseases in type 2 diabetes mellitus: a systematic review and meta-analysis of prospective studies

OBJECTIVE: The importance of triglycerides (TG) level as a risk factor for cardiovascular diseases (CVD) has been extensively investigated in the general population; however, their relationship in patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) is uncertain. We aimed to assess the association of TG with CVD in T2DM individuals. RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODS: We searched bibliographic databases for studies published until June 2018, reporting on the relationship between TG and CVD in T2DM people. A random-effects model with inverse variance weighting was used to compute pooled estimates of the most fully adjusted risk ratios (RR) and corresponding 95% confidence intervals (CI) according to TG categories, unit TG, and logarithm (log) of TG for CVD. RESULTS: A total of 31 studies were included, involving 132,044 T2DM patients with 10,733 incident cardiovascular events. The pooled RR (95% CI) of CVD for an increase in baseline TG, log TG by 1-mmol/l and categorized in the highest vs. the lowest TG in T2DM were 1.06 (1.02, 1.09), 1.30 (1.18, 1.42) and 1.30 (1.16, 1.46), corresponding to a CVD risk increase of 6%, 30% and 30%, respectively. The pooled RR (95% CI) of CVD for per 1-mmol/L TG increment in eight studies and TG categories in three studies were 1.03 (0.98, 1.08) and 1.39 (0.92, 2.1) in T2DM patients adjusted for other lipids parameter, respectively. CONCLUSIONS: In T2DM patients, an elevated triglyceride level cannot serve as an independent marker for an increased risk of cardiovascular events, but still, the higher serum TG levels tend to be associated with increased risks of CVD. ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL: The online version of this article (10.1186/s12933-019-0851-z) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.