Level of health in old age and levels of glutamine and amino acids

As life expectancy increases, so does the presence of chronic conditions and multimorbidity (presence of multiple chronic diseases). One of the current social and health challenges is that the ‘extra’ years of life are lived in good health by older people.

Some sociodemographic aspects such as age, gender or socioeconomic level have been seen as factors related to multimorbidity, but many others are still unknown. Among these determinants is the metabolomic profile.

Amino acids, for example, are metabolites that can play a critical role in the aging process. Various previous studies have found an association between high levels of amino acids and the development of diabetes or cardiovascular disease.

Now, researchers from the Department of Preventive Medicine, Public Health and Microbiology of the Autonomous University of Madrid (UAM) and the Center for Biomedical Research in the Epidemiology and Public Health Network (CIBERESP), both entities in Spain, have carried out a study in the that there is an association between high blood concentrations of glutamine and branched-chain amino acids (such as isoleucine and valine) and an increased risk of multimorbidity.

The study authors had previously observed an association between high plasma concentrations of glutamine and essential amino acids and disability in older people.

“The association found in both works for glutamine seems very relevant, since this amino acid is the one with the greatest presence in the human body and excessive concentrations could be harmful,” they say.

The new study was carried out on 1,488 people over the age of 65.

Reaching old age in good health requires having led a healthy lifestyle, but it also depends on other factors. (Photo: Cade Martin/CDC/Dawn Arlotta)

“We have had information collected at two different moments of time, analyzing the blood concentrations of these metabolites in a specialized international laboratory”, explains Francisco Félix Caballero, main author of the study.

“In the same way -he adds-, we have been careful and exhaustive in the definition of multimorbidity, counting on the information on the presence of chronic diseases registered electronically and generating, from sophisticated statistical models, a quantitative measure based on a list of 60 ailments Chronicles”.

For her part, co-author Esther López-García concludes that “the identification of the molecular bases of multimorbidity can be useful to find effective treatments on altered mechanisms that solve multiple diseases and not just one.”

The study is titled “Prospective Association Between Plasma Amino Acids And Multimorbidity In Older Adults.” And it has been published in the academic journal The Journals of Gerontology: Series A. (Source: UAM)