Effect of menopausal hormone therapy on methylation levels in early and late postmenopausal women

Clinical Epigenetics

Table 1 Clinical characteristics of study participants

Trait (N or %)	Early/Placebo (n = 48)	Early/Treatment (n = 48)	^aLate/Placebo (n = 42)	Late/Treatment (n = 48)	^bp-value
Age	55.5 (5.2)	55.3 (4.7)	65.1 (7.8)	66.7 (8.1)	< 0.0001
Years since menopause	3.3 (3.1)	3.5 (3.5)	14.6 (7.9)	14 (6.7)	< 0.0001
Ethnicity					0.68
White Non-Hispanic	34 [71]	39 [81]	30 [71]	33 [44]
Black Non-Hispanic	8 [17]	2 [4]	4 [45]	6 [13]
Hispanic	3 [6]	5 [45]	6 [14]	5 [45]
Asian	3 [6]	2 [4]	2 [46]	4 [8]
Smoking					0.70
Never	24 [50]	28 [58]	24 [57]	33 [44]
Former	22 [46]	19 [46]	17 [46]	14 [29]
Current	2 [4]	1 [2]	1 [2]	1 [2]
Body mass index	27.0 (6.6)	26.1 (5.3)	27.1 (5.5)	26.2 (7.8)	0.90
Total cholesterol, mg/dL	233 (46)	231 (30)	227 (30)	222 (53)	0.64
LDL, mg/dL	144 (41)	147 (37)	137 (42)	133 (52)	0.30
HDL, mg/dL	64 (26)	60 (20)	63 (29)	59 (22.5)	0.73
SBP, mmHg	120 (21)	117 [15]	121 (19)	122 [13]	0.09
DBP, mmHg	77 (10)	77 (9)	75 (7)	75 [11]	0.47
*Change in free estradiol (pg/mL)	0.015 (0.09)	0.38 (0.45)	0.01 (0.12)	0.35 (0.70)	< 0.0001
*Change in CIMT, mm	0.048 (0.017)	− 0.011 (0.029)	0.057 (0.014)	0.059 (0.014)	< 0.0001

Data are shown as median (IQR) or as n [%]
^*Change is shown as the difference between baseline and 36 months after treatment (calculated as post–pre)
^aSix subjects in the late/placebo group whose methylation data did not pass QC steps were excluded from all analyses
^bP-values for differences between groups were derived from Kruskal–Wallis tests for continuous variables or chi-square tests for dichotomous/categorical traits, respectively

ISSN: 1868-7083