Performance of Visceral Fat Level in Predicting Cardiometabolic Syndrome Risk Factor in Royal Thai Navy

Abstract

Cardiometabolic syndrome (CMS) comprises a cluster of metabolic disorders in the body and the associated risks of cardiovascular disease. Currently, the incidence of CMS is increasing, especially in the normal body mass index (BMI) group. High visceral fat (VF) level is also known to be associated with the cardiometabolic disorder. This study aimed to examine the levels of VF in cardiometabolic syndrome and the association of VF with the parameters related to the cardiometabolic disorder. A case-control study was conducted in the Royal Thai Navy with 200 CMS and 200 non-CMS groups. All participants aged between 35 and 60 years had normal BMI range of 18.5 to 24.9 kg/m2 by cardiometabolic disease staging system (CMDS) criteria. The level of VF increased significantly in participants with cardiometabolic group (p-value < 0.001) and was positively associated with fasting glucose, cholesterol, triglycerides,LDL-cholesterol, systolic blood pressure and diastolic blood pressure (r = 0.310, r = 0.300,r = 0.429, r = 0.394, r = 0.550 and r = 0.643; p < 0.05). Multivariate regression analysis found a high level of visceral fat (1.3; 95%CI 1.096 - 1.453) and hypertriglyceridemia (1.7; 95% CI 1.052 - 2.203) were significantly correlated with the cardiometabolic syndrome while HDL- cholesterol was a protective factor (0.96; 95%CI 0.941 - 0.998). In conclusion, high visceral fat

levels reflect increases in high blood lipid and blood pressure and VF is considered a suitable biomarker for risk evaluation of cardiometabolic syndrome