Metabolic syndrome

Integrating metabolic syndrome into global risk assessment

Although the metabolic syndrome increases the relative risk of CHD, its diagnosis alone is not sufficient to properly assess this risk,¹ which should be assessed on the basis of traditional risk factors using available algorithms.² The global CVD risk resulting from the presence of traditional risk factors and from the metabolic abnormalities of abdominal obesity and the metabolic syndrome has been defined as the global cardiometabolic risk.³

Cardiometabolic risk is the overall risk of CVD resulting from both the presence of metabolic syndrome and of traditional risk factors such as dyslipidemia (raised LDL cholesterol and low HDL cholesterol), hypertension, diabetes, age, male sex, smoking and other unknown risk factors (including genetic factors that cannot be properly assessed in clinical practice at the present time). The additional degree of risk contributed by the metabolic syndrome is unclear at the present time.

1. Kahn, R., Buse, J., Ferrannini, E. et al. The metabolic syndrome: Time for a critical appraisal: Joint statement from the American Diabetes Association and the European Association for the Study of Diabetes. Diabetes Care 2005; 28: 2289-2304.
2. Després, J.P., Lemieux, I. Abdominal obesity and metabolic syndrome. Nature 2006; 14: 881-887.
3. Tuomilehto, J. Cardiovascular risk: Prevention and treatment of the metabolic syndrome.
   Diabetes Res Clin Pract 2005; 68 (Suppl. 2): S28-S35.