TUESDAY, July 7 (HealthDay News) -- Regardless of race, people with higher levels of the protein adiponectin may have a significantly lower risk of developing type 2 diabetes, according to a study published in the July 8 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association.

Shanshan Li, M.D., of the Harvard School of Public Health in Boston, and colleagues conducted a meta-analysis of 13 studies that included 14,598 subjects, 2,623 of whom had been diagnosed with type 2 diabetes.

The researchers found that each 1-log µg/mL increment in adiponectin levels was associated with a lower risk of type 2 diabetes (relative risk, 0.72). They also found that this dose-dependent relationship was consistent among Caucasians, East Asians, Asian Indians, African-Americans and Native Americans, and was not significantly affected by the type of adiponectin assay, method of diabetes ascertainment, study size, length of follow-up, body mass index, or proportions of men and women.

"Although these epidemiologic studies cannot establish causality, the consistency of the association across diverse populations, the dose-response relationship, and the supportive findings in mechanistic studies indicate that adiponectin is a promising target for the reduction of risk of type 2 diabetes," the authors write.

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