Serum phospholipids and sphingolipids are linked to early-stage osteoarthritis by lipidomic profiling

Table 1 Demographic and clinical characteristics of patients

	Healthy controls (serum) n = 31	Postmortem donors (SF) n = 13	Patients early OA (serum + SF) n = 29	Patients late OA (serum + SF) n = 29
Age [years]	26 (24–32) n = 31	24 (21–28) n = 13	41 (33–54)*** n = 29	67 (57–71)*** n = 29
female/male	12/19	1/12	13/16	13/16
BMI	23.1 (22.2–24.7) n = 31	24.8 (21.4–25.2) n = 13	26.4 (24.0-29.4) n = 29**	29.3 (26.2–31.4) n = 29***
CRP	0.5 (0.5–0.6) n = 31	NA	0.8 (0.5–1.3) n = 29	1.5 (0.8–2.1)** n = 29
OU-score	NA	NA	1.1 (0.7–1.5) n = 29	3.2 (2.7–3.5) n = 27
K/L-score	NA	NA	1.0 (0.0–1.0) n = 22	3.0 (3.0–4.0) n = 26
Cholesterol	178 (151–206) n = 29	NA	201 (177–222)* n = 28	223 (198–259)*** n = 28
HDL Chol.	58 (46–64) n = 29	NA	51 (40–57) n = 28	58 (46–67) n = 25
LDL Chol.	102 (87–128) n = 29	NA	124 (98–141)* n = 28	122 (109–156)*** n = 25
VLDL Chol.	20 (15–25) n = 29	NA	29 (23–32)* n = 28	31 (24–42)*** n = 25
TG	91 (79–134) n = 29	NA	133 (102–167)* n = 28	149 (131–176)*** n = 28
Apo-AI	150 (131–166) n = 26	NA	161 (143–173) n = 28	164 (152–193)* n = 19
Apo B-100	90 (75–100) n = 26	NA	100 (85–120)* n = 28	114 (95–128)*** n = 19

Data are presented as medians with interquartile range in brackets, and the concentrations of parameters were determined in serum. BMI, body mass index [kg/m²]; Apo-AI, apolipoprotein AI [mg/dL]; Apo B-100, apolipoprotein B-100 [mg/dL]; CRP, C-reactive protein [mg/L]; HDL Chol, High Density Lipoprotein Cholesterol [mg/dL]; K/L-score, Kellgren Lawrence score; LDL Chol, Low density Lipoprotein Cholesterol [mg/dL]; OU-score, Outerbridge score; SF, synovial fluid; TG, triglyceride [mg/dL]; VLDL Chol, Very Low Density Lipoprotein Cholesterol [mg/dL]; NA, not available. Statistically significant differences versus controls were determined using Welch´s two sample t-test after log-transformation and are indicated by p-values: * 0.05 > p > 0.01, ** 0.01 ≥ p > 0.001, *** 0.001 ≥ p

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