4.9. Data Analysis
Statistical analyses were performed with SPSS Statistics version 25 (IBM Corp., Chicago/IL, USA). Data distribution was checked using Kolmogorov–Smirnov tests and presented as either mean ± standard deviation or median with interquartile range (IQR). Extreme outliers of relative changes after treatment, identified with boxplots and defined as cases lying 3*IQR distant, were removed from the data set. Within-group comparisons before and after treatment were tested with either paired Generalized linear mixed models with random effect on subjects were used to investigate group × time-interaction effects between groups and presented as estimated mean with 95% confidence interval (95% CI). All models were adjusted for age, sex, and FMI, since we observed significant associations with our markers of interest. Inflammatory markers were also adjusted for baseline values, when significantly different between groups at baseline. Due to skewness, inflammatory markers have been log-transformed before analyses. In addition, we performed sex-stratified analyses with mixed models adjusted for age and FMI, and compared group-specific changes between sexes with either unpaired 