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© 2025 Rico et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (the “License”), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. Notwithstanding the ProQuest Terms and Conditions, you may use this content in accordance with the terms of the License.

Abstract

Background

Besides the usual characterization of metabolic syndrome as a cluster of markers arbitrarily defined by thresholds, it is unclear to which extent these markers as continuous traits are correlated with each other in the general population. The present study aimed to explore these correlations across a wide array of biological, social and behavioral characteristics.

Methods

The cross-sectional analyses were performed in a large population-based French cohort (CONSTANCES) of 159,476 adults in whom blood glucose, low-density lipoproteins (LDL) and high-density lipoproteins (HDL), triglycerides, body mass index, waist and hip circumferences, systolic and diastolic blood pressures were measured at the time of recruitment between 2012 and 2021. Correlations between each pair of continuous marker distributions were assessed by calculating raw and partial correlation coefficients (r).

Results

The same pattern of partial correlations is observed with little variation in all groups of sex, age, individual and parental histories of cardiovascular disease, diagnosis of metabolic syndrome, social position, work environment, lifetime unemployment exposure, smoking, non-moderate alcohol consumption, leisure-time physical inactivity and diet quality. This pattern is composed of strong and expected intercorrelations between systolic and diastolic blood pressures (r ranging from 0.62 to 0.74), between body mass index and waist (r from 0.50 to 0.63) and hip (r from 0.58 to 0.70) circumferences and between waist and hip circumferences (r from 0.07 to 0.19). It also includes intercorrelations of systolic blood pressure with waist (r from 0.10 to 0.21) and hip (r from −0.07 to −0.12) circumferences and with blood glucose (r from 0.09 to 0.15), those of triglycerides with blood glucose (r from 0.07 to 0.16), LDL (r from 0.24 to 0.33), HDL (r from −0.20 to −0.29) and waist circumference (r from 0.07 to 0.15), and finally those of waist and hip circumferences with blood glucose (r from 0.09 to 0.17 and from −0.08 to −0.13) and HDL (r from −0.12 to −0.24 and from 0.08 to 0.18).

Conclusions

These results show that metabolic syndrome markers are correlated with each other whatever the biological, social or behavioral characteristics of individuals. They suggest that it makes sense to systematically consider these markers all together rather than separately in terms of etiology, prevention and treatment of metabolic diseases and cardiovascular risk in the general population.

Details

Title
Omnipresent intercorrelations of metabolic syndrome markers in the general population
Author
Marina Sanchez Rico; Wiernik, Emmanuel; Kab, Sofiane; Renuy, Adeline; Hoertel, Nicolas; Ménard, Joël; Goldberg, Marcel  VIAFID ORCID Logo  ; Zins, Marie  VIAFID ORCID Logo  ; Meneton, Pierre  VIAFID ORCID Logo 
First page
e0328577
Section
Research Article
Publication year
2025
Publication date
Aug 2025
Publisher
Public Library of Science
e-ISSN
19326203
Source type
Scholarly Journal
Language of publication
English
ProQuest document ID
3239701403
Copyright
© 2025 Rico et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (the “License”), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. Notwithstanding the ProQuest Terms and Conditions, you may use this content in accordance with the terms of the License.