The Association between Epicardial Adipose Tissue and Coronary Artery Disease in Hemodialysis Patients Using a Systematic Review

Abstract

The role of epicardial adipose tissue (EAT) may play in the pathogenesis of coronary vascular disease CVD in patients on hemodialysis and whether imaging of  EAT may hold prognostic implications for CVD events and mortality within this patient group .This systematic review investigated the association between epicardial adipose tissue and developing coronary artery diseases in patients undergoing hemodialysis.  A search strategy was developed to identify primary studies published until 2 November/2019.  Studies were obtained from multiple electronic databases (PubMed, HINARI, Science Direct). Searches were supplemented by hand searching and checking the reference lists of included articles. After the removal of duplicates, the search identified 89 titles, following title and abstract review twenty–three publications were considered potentially relevant, of which 6 studies were retrieved plus two studies from references list. The eight studies were included in the current review. Epicardial Adipose tissue thickness or volume is correlated significantly with coronary artery calcification in hemodialysis patients regardless its long term or incident.  This systematic review suggests the significant relationship between epicardial adipose tissue and developing coronary artery disease in this special cohort of patients, hemodialysis patients.  Further research should consider more the availability of using EAT as a non-invasive method to assess cardiovascular risk in HD patients.