Prevalence of metabolic syndrome among middle-aged and elderly adults in China: current status and temporal trends

Abstract

Background: Metabolic syndrome (MetS) is a cluster of major risk factors for cardiovascular diseases. We aimed to estimate prevalence and distribution of MetS among middle-aged and elderly adults in China.

Methods: The present analysis used data from a national study in 2014–2015. We defined MetS by different definitions, and compared results of the present study and previous nationally representative studies to illustrate possible temporal changes in MetS prevalence.

Results: The estimated prevalence of MetS was 18.4% by the ATP III criteria, 34.0% by the revised ATP III criteria, and 26.9% by IDF criteria. The prevalence was higher in women, older adults, those with lower education level, and in economically developed regions. Contrasting with previous national studies, adults in urban areas had a lower rate of MetS than those in rural areas (odds ratio 0.94; 95% CI 0.92−0.97). Rural adults had worse deterioration or less improvement in abdominal obesity, overweight, hypertension, and high fasting plasma glucose, than urban adults, which was particularly striking for women.

Conclusion: While measures to prevent and control cardiovascular diseases need to be strengthened in China, rapid increasing risk factors among rural residents and women should be prioritized in making public health policy decisions.

KEY MESSAGES

• Our study assessed prevalence and temporal changes of MetS among Chinese population with the most recently completed and the largest sample size.

• The current prevalence of MetS was higher in women, older adults, those with lower education level, and in economically developed regions and the CVD risk factors among rural residents and women should be prioritised in making public health policy decisions.

• A comparison of results of the present study and previous national studies showed that rural adults had worse deterioration or less improvement in abdominal obesity, overweight, hypertension, and high fasting plasma glucose, than urban adults, which was particularly striking for women.

Keywords:

• Metabolic syndrome
• prevalence
• trends
• epidemiology

Acknowledgements

The authors thank the National Project Office of Stroke Prevention and Control for data support. In addition, this research uses data from China Health and Nutrition Survey (CHNS). The authors thank the National Institute for Nutrition and Health, China Center for Disease Control and Prevention, Carolina Population Center (P2C HD050924, T32 HD007168), the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, the NIH (R01-HD30880, DK056350, R24 HD050924, and R01-HD38700) and the NIH Fogarty International Center (D43 TW009077, D43 TW007709) for financial support for the CHNS data collection and analysis files from 1989 to 2015 and future surveys, and the China–Japan Friendship Hospital, Ministry of Health for support for CHNS 2009, Chinese National Human Genome Center at Shanghai since 2009, and Beijing Municipal Center for Disease Prevention and Control since 2011.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

This study was funded by the Ministry of Finance of the People’s Republic of China (Issued by Finance and Social Security [2011] Document No. 61, Ministry of Finance), the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, China [2016YXMS215], and the China Postdoctoral Science Foundation funded project [2017M622466]. The funder had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.