Prevalence of metabolic syndrome among adult population in India: A systematic review and meta-analysis

• Published in: PloS one Vol. 15; no. 10; p. e0240971
• Main Authors: Krishnamoorthy, Yuvaraj, Rajaa, Sathish, Murali, Sharan, Rehman, Tanveer, Sahoo, Jayaprakash, Kar, Sitanshu Sekhar
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: United States Public Library of Science 19.10.2020; Public Library of Science (PLoS)
• Subjects: Adult; Adults; Age Distribution; Bias; Confidence intervals; Demographic aspects; Diabetes; Diagnosis; Disease prevention; Distribution; Earth Sciences; Ethnicity; Female; Females; Gender; Heterogeneity; Humans; India - epidemiology; Male; Medical education; Medical ethics; Medicine; Medicine and Health Sciences; Meta-analysis; Metabolic disorders; Metabolic syndrome; Metabolic Syndrome - epidemiology; Metabolic syndrome X; Middle Aged; Mortality; People and Places; Physical Sciences; Population; Prevalence; Quality assessment; Research and Analysis Methods; Risk Factors; Risk groups; Science Policy; Search engines; Sex Characteristics; Systematic review; Urban areas; Young Adult; India; United States > US
• ISSN: 1932-6203; 1932-6203
• DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0240971

This review was done to determine the prevalence of metabolic syndrome (MS) among adult general population in India. We also wanted to find the gender, setting, and region-wide distribution of MS in India. We conducted systematic searches in various databases including Medline, ScienceDirect, Cochrane library and Google Scholar from inception until August 2019. We included studies conducted in India reporting the prevalence of MS among adults aged 18 years or more. We used the Newcastle Ottawa scale to assess the quality of included studies. We carried out a meta-analysis with random-effects model and reported pooled prevalence with 95% confidence intervals (CIs). We used the Funnel plot to assess publication biases. In total, we analysed 113 data from 111 studies with 133,926 participants. Majority of the included studies (76 out of 111) had low risk of bias. We found significant heterogeneity among the included studies (p<0.001). We also found a symmetrical funnel plot indicating an absence of publication bias. The prevalence of MS among adult population in India was 30% (95%CI: 28%-33%). There was a steady increase in the burden across the age groups from 13% (18-29 years group) to 50% (50-59 years). We also found that people living in urban areas (32%; 95%CI: 29%-36%) had higher prevalence when compared to tribal (28%; 95%CI: 21%-36%) or rural adults (22%; 95%CI: 20%-25%). Gender distribution of MS showed that the females had higher prevalence (35%; 95%CI: 31%-38%) when compared to males 26% (95%CI: 22%-29%). Almost one in three adults in India suffer from MS. Females, people living in urban areas and in northeast region had higher prevalence of MS. Development and implementation of policies and protocols for the screening of MS would enable us in early diagnosis and treatment with special focus towards the vulnerable and high-risk groups.