Adiponectin: a relevant player in obesity-related colorectal cancer?
- Correspondence to Professor Antonio La Cava, Department of Medicine, University of California Los Angeles, 1000 Veteran Avenue 32-59, Los Angeles, CA 90095-1670, USA; alacava{at}mednet.ucla.edu
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Contributors ALC is solely responsible for the manuscript. He has the right to grant and does grant an exclusive licence on a worldwide basis to the BMJ Publishing Group Ltd and its Licensees to permit this article to be published in Gut editions and any other BMJPGL products to exploit all subsidiary rights, as set out in their licence.
Obesity is a condition characterised by an abnormally elevated mass of body fat. The past decades have seen a dramatic rise in the worldwide incidence of obesity due to lifestyle changes that have led to an overall reduced physical activity and an increase in the intake of excessive and/or highly caloric or processed foods. As a consequence, obesity represents nowadays a major global health concern. In particular, several epidemiological studies have linked obesity to a shortened lifespan due primarily to a higher risk for the development of chronic pathologies that include cardiovascular complications such as high blood pressure, coronary heart disease and stroke, in addition to insulin resistance and type 2 diabetes.1 Additionally, obesity has also been shown to increase the risk of developing different types of tumours such as the cancer of the oesophagus, colon, rectum, pancreas, gallbladder, kidney, breast, thyroid and endometrium.2
In obesity, low …
