High prevalence of prolonged qt interval in obese hypogonadal males

Obese subjects show several electrocardiographic alterations, including prolonged QT interval, a marker for fatal cardiac arrhythmias. Prolonged QT interval has recently been linked to low testosterone levels, a frequent occurrence in male obese patients but no study has yet assessed whether hypoandrogenism contributes to QT interval prolongation in this population. Aim of this study was to evaluate whether prolonged QT interval is linked to hypogonadism in male obese subjects. QT interval corrected for heart rate (QTc) was measured from standard electrocardiogram recordings in 136 obese men (BMI 30 kg/m ², range 30.1-75.4kg/m ²). Obese men were classified as eugonadal or hypogonadal according to serum total testosterone levels (i.e., greater or less than 9.9nmol/l). Our study showed that QTc measurements corrected by either Bazett (419±3.2 vs. 408±3.4ms, P