1. ^*Program for Population Genetics, Harvard School of Public Health, Boston, Massachusetts;
2. ^§Department of Nutrition, Harvard School of Public Health, Boston, Massachusetts;
3. ^¶Department of Biostatistics, Harvard School of Public Health, Boston, Massachusetts;
4. ^†Anhui Institute of Biomedicine, Anhui Medical University, Hefei, Anhui, China;
5. ^‡School of Life Science, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, Anhui, China;
6. Center for Population Genetics, School of Public Health, University of Illinois, Chicago, Illinois.

Correspondence: Xin Xu Program for Population Genetics, Harvard School of Public Health, 665 Huntington Avenue, FXB-101, Boston, MA 02115. E-mail: xin_xu@harvard.edu

^*The costs of publication of this article were defrayed, in part, by the payment of page charges. This article must, therefore, be hereby marked "advertisement" in accordance with 18 U.S.C. Section 1734 solely to indicate this fact.

Received 15 February 2006; Accepted 22 August 2006.

Abstract

Objective: To investigate the prevalence of metabolic syndrome (MetS) with three different working definitions in a rural Chinese population and to examine its relation to body composition.

Research Methods and Procedures: A total of 18,630 adults 25 to 64 years old (mean age, 45.8 years; 51.2% men) from 5686 families were enrolled from Anhui province of China during 2004 to 2005. Anthropometric measurement, body composition, blood pressure, plasma lipids, and fasting glucose and insulin and a questionnaire-based interview were obtained from each participant. Three different working definitions for MetS, including the U.S. National Cholesterol Education Program's Adult Treatment Panel III, a modified Adult Treatment Panel III that adopts the World Health Organization's criterion for central obesity in Asian populations, and one recently proposed by the International Diabetes Federation, were used in the study.

Results: According to the three definitions, the age-adjusted prevalence of MetS for adults 25 to 64 years old was 3.2% , 4.9% , and 3.9% in men and 7.2% , 11.5% , and 10.9% in women, respectively. MetS prevalence increases significantly with age in women, but not in men. Body fat percentage and BMI and waist circumference were significantly associated with each component of MetS, especially with triglyceride level, insulin resistance index, and number of MetS components (r = 0.28 to 0.49).

Discussion: The age-adjusted prevalence of MetS in our study population is lower than that reported in other urban Chinese populations. Significant gender differences in MetS prevalence were observed. The waist circumference is a good surrogate for abdominal fat percentage.