Metabolic syndrome components among asthmatic males and females

Metabolic syndrome components among asthmatic males and females
Younes Aftabi,^1,* Ensiyeh Seyedrezazadeh,² Neda Gilani,³ Fahimeh Bagheri Amiri,⁴ Khalil Ansarin,⁵
1. Tuberculosis and Lung Diseases Research Center, Tabriz University of Medical Sciences, Tabriz, Iran.
2. Tuberculosis and Lung Diseases Research Center, Tabriz University of Medical Sciences, Tabriz, Iran.
3. Department of Statistics and Epidemiology, Faculty of Health, Tabriz University of Medical Sciences, Tabriz, Iran.
4. Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, Research Centre for Emerging and Reemerging Infectious Diseases, Pasteur Institute of Iran, Tehran, Iran
5. Tuberculosis and Lung Diseases Research Center, Tabriz University of Medical Sciences, Tabriz, Iran.
Introduction: Asthma is one of the most common major non-communicable diseases and metabolic syndrome (MetS) prevalence is high in the population of asthma patients. Indeed, MetS impairs lung function, but the details of interaction have remained mostly unknown. The MetS is a group of risk factors diagnosed by a co-occurrence of three out of five risk factors of the high waist circumference (WC) which represents central obesity, Blood pressure (BP), Fasting blood sugar (FBS), Serum triglycerides (TG), and low high-density lipoprotein cholesterol (HDL). Recently, an emerging increased prevalence of MetS risk factors among Iranians, especially among the Azarbaijani population has been reported. Considering the possibility of different roles of MetS components in interaction with asthma and gender of affected patients, this study aimed to analyze and compare the frequencies of MetS components among asthmatic male and female patients, which was supported financially by the National Institute for Medical Research Development of IRAN (Code: 957667).
Methods: Attended patients to the office of pulmonary specialist affiliated to Tuberculosis and Lung Diseases Research Center, Tabriz University of Medical Sciences, Tabriz, Iran, were examined and asthmatic cases diagnosed by spirometry tests were included in the study. Risk levels of MetS components were identified following IDF definition: WC (man>102cm, woman>88cm), BP (≥130/85 mmHg, or on the treatment of previously diagnosed hypertension), FBS (≥100 mg/dl, or on the treatment of previously diagnosed type 2 diabetes mellitus), TG (>150mg/dl), and HDL (man<40 mg/dl and woman<50 mg/dl) or on the treatment of previously diagnosed dyslipidemia. Research protocols were approved by the medical ethics committee of the research council of the National Institute for Medical Research Development, Tehran, Iran (IR-NIMAD-REC-1396-032). All participants signed informed consent for participation. Statistical analysis of the collected data was done using SPSS version 26.
Results: Among 588 asthmatic patients, risk levels of WC and BP were observed in 63.3% and 18.4% respectively. Also, 82.3% of females and 36.5% of males had a risk level of WC, and the difference of these frequencies was significant (P<0.001). Furthermore, the frequency of risk levels of BP in females (23%) was significantly higher (P=0.001) in comparison with the frequency in males (11.9%). However, smoking, drug abuse, and drinking frequencies were significantly higher (P<0.001) among males. There was no significant difference between male and female patients in the frequency of risk levels of other MetS components such as TG (males: 8.2%, females: 9.6%), HDL (males: 7.4%, females: 9.0%), and FBS (males: 6.6%, females: 7.8%).
Conclusion: Elevated risk levels of waist circumstance and blood pressure were observed among asthmatic patients. In comparison with asthmatic males, risk levels of waist circumference and blood pressure were significantly higher among females with asthma disease.
Keywords: Asthma, Metabolic syndrome, Disease-disease interaction, Central obesity, Blood pressure.