Prevalence of Metabolic Syndrome and Related Factors in Patients with Non-alcoholic Fatty Liver

This study was designed to investigate the prevalence of metabolic syndrome in patients diagnosed with non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) referring to the gastrointestinal and endocrinology clinics of Golestan and Imam Khomeini Hospitals, Ahvaz.

The current cross-sectional study was performed on patients with NAFLD referring to the gastroenterology and endocrinology clinics of Golestan and Emam Khomeini hospitals, Ahvaz in the second half of 2020. Demographic information included age, gender, lumbar posture (while standing and the waist be in the upper edge of the iliac crest at the end of a normal exhalation using a non-elastic meter), grading fatty liver evidenced by ultrasound, and blood pressure and laboratory parameters, including triglyceride (TG), fasting blood sugar (FBS), and high-density lipoprotein (HDL) was recorded in the checklist. Data analysis was performed using SPSS 26.0 software.

This study was performed on 130 patients with an average age of 46.22 ± 14.27 years. Patients comprised 42 men (32.8%) and 88 women (67.2/%). Also, 63.84% of the patients with NAFLD had metabolic syndrome, and 56.2, 69.6, and 81.8% with grades 1, 2, and 3 of fatty liver, respectively had metabolic syndrome. There was a significant difference in terms of mean height and weight in both gender. There was a significant relationship between age and FBS, so that the levels of FBS increased statistically significantly with age (P < 0.05). Gender had a statistically significant relationship with HDL and waist circumference (P = 0.038). There was no statistically significant relationship between blood pressure, TG, HDL, FBS, and waist circumference, and different grades of fatty liver (P > 0.05).

The current study showed a significant number of patients with NAFLD had metabolic syndrome, so that the most common symptom of metabolic syndrome was low HDL levels, followed by high FBS levels, blood pressure, and TG levels and waist circumference size. Nevertheless, it was not probable to assess whether NAFLD precedes the progress of metabolic syndrome.