Diurnal variation in serum alanine aminotransferase activity in the US population.

ABSTRACT:

Goals and background

Serum alanine aminotransferase (ALT) activity has been reported to be greater in the afternoon than the early morning, but data are scarce. We examined diurnal variation of ALT in a national population-based sample.

Study

Participants in the 1999 to 2008 US National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey were randomly assigned to morning (AM; n = 4474 adolescents, 11,235 adults) or afternoon/evening (PM; n = 4887 adolescents, 11,735 adults) examinations. We examined ALT distributions graphically and compared both geometric mean ALT and the prevalence of elevated ALT, defined as >31 IU/L for adolescent boys, >24 IU/L for adolescent girls, >43 IU/L for adult men, and >30 IU/L for adult women, between AM and PM examination groups.

Results

The examin

SUBMITTER: Ruhl CE 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3545081 | biostudies-literature | 2013 Feb

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature