Table 2. Plasma fatty acid composition of polar lipids of the study participants^*.

Fatty acid	Female Controls (n=10)	Hemodialysis Patients		P value (female controls vs. patients)	P value (female vs. male patients)
		Female (n=9)	Male (n=11)
Linoleic acid (18:2n-6)	18.16 ± 3.29			18.40 ± 2.28	19.91± 3.63	0.86	0.29
Arachidonic acid (20:4n-6)	11.47 ± 1.71			13.61 ± 1.87	13.35 ± 2.61	0.019	0.81
Eicosapentaenoic acid (20:5n-3)	0.71 ± 0.28	0.38 ± 0.09	0.38 ± 0.13	0.005	0.94
Docosahexaenoic acid (22:6n-3)	3.11 ± 1.57	2.68 ± 0.78	2.20 ± 0.77	0.46	0.19
Ratio of long chain n-6/n-3†	3.72 ± 1.29	4.65 ± 0.86	4.93 ± 0.66	0.087	0.42

^*Values are means ± SD of weight percentages.

^†LCn-6=20:2n-6+20:3n-6+20:4n-6+22:4n-6+22:5n-6; LCn-3=20:5n-3+22:5n-3+22:6n-3

NB: Differences between male patients and control females for 20:4n-6 and 20:5n-3 were significant (P ≤ 0.01).