Prevalence of the metabolic syndrome in Pudong New Area of Shanghai using three proposed definitions among Chinese adults

This cross-sectional study included 5,584 adults at age 20-79 randomly selected from Pudong New Area of Shanghai, China, through a three-stage sampling. All participants were interviewed in-person between April and July of 2008 to collect information on demographic and lifestyle characteristics. At the interview, anthropometry and blood pressure were measured and bio-specimens were collected.The prevalence estimates for the MS increased with age for each definition in men and women, but the estimates varied greatly between the definitions and by sex. The prevalence of the MS was higher in men (20.2%) than in women (18.7%) using WHO definition but this sex difference was reversed when using the modified ATP III (28.4% for men vs. 35.1% for women) and the IDF (15.9% for men vs. 26.7% for women) criteria. The most common metabolic disorder in this population was dyslipidaemia, regardless of the definition used. Substantial agreement, estimated using the kappa statistic, was found between the modified ATP III and IDF definition, whereas the lowest agreement was observed between the WHO and ATP III criteria.The MS is highly prevalent among Chinese adults in Pudong New Area of Shanghai and the most prevalent component was dyslipidemia. These findings underscore the importance of prevention and control efforts for the MS in this area and the need for a unified predictive definition for the syndrome for use by clinical practitioners and public health agencies.The metabolic syndrome (MS) is a cluster of the most dangerous risk factors for type 2 diabetes mellitus and cardiovascular disease (CVD), including abdominal obesity, hypertension, hyperglycemia and dyslipidemia. When these metabolic abnormalities occur in the same individual they confer an additional cardiovascular risk above and beyond the contribution of the individual components [1,2]. It is estimated that the risk from the MS for major cardiovascular events is approximately twice as high as for those with the syn