Publications by authors named "Yoshihisa Fujiura"

Hepatocyte growth factor (HGF) is one of the adipocytokines. We evaluated whether serum levels of HGF are related to the metabolic syndrome. A total of 1474 subjects of a general population free of liver, kidney, and lung diseases received a health examination.

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Objective: Endothelin-1 (ET-1) is a potent vasoconstrictor derived from the endothelium. Several studies with small numbers of humans have showed high plasma ET-1 levels in hypertension, but other studies have not. Furthermore, it has been shown in a small number of subjects that ET-1 is elevated in uraemic patients.

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Background And Purpose: We examined whether hyperhomocysteinemia is an independent risk factor for increased carotid artery intimal-medial wall thickness (IMT) in a large, randomly selected community in Japan where the dietary habit is different and the incidence of coronary artery disease is lower compared with those of western countries.

Methods: In 1111 cases (452 men, 659 women) aged 63+/-10 years old (range, 40 to 94 years) recruited from a population-based survey performed in 1999, we measured fasting plasma total homocysteine levels and performed bilateral carotid B-mode ultrasound. The participants underwent measurements of other blood chemistries (total cholesterol, HDL cholesterol, glycosylated hemoglobin A(1c), and creatinine).

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