A low-fat diet may help curb metabolic syndrome risk in women

Metabolic syndrome is a known risk factor for cardiovascular disease, diabetes, and cancer. The diagnosis is made based on the presence of 3 or more of the following clinical signs:

• waist circumference of 88 cm or more;
• serum triglycerides of 1.7 mmol/L or more;
• blood pressure of 130/85 mmHg or more;
• HDL cholesterol of less than 1.3 mmol/L;
• serum glucose of 5.5 mmol/L or more.

Rates of metabolic syndrome are growing in the developing world, with a recent Indian study finding rates of close to 20% among urban Indian adults (Cholesterol, 2011). Studies have shown that due to genetic susceptibility, Indian patients may be at risk of[s2If !is_user_logged_in()]…

[/s2If][s2If is_user_logged_in()] developing metabolic syndrome even when their risk profiles are not as pronounced.

In an effort to determine whether lowering dietary fat intake can reduce the risk of metabolic syndrome, The Women’s Health Initiative Dietary Modification Trial randomized more than 48,000 women in the United States to a low-fat diet (consisting of 20% energy from fat) or their usual diet, and followed them for a mean of 8.1 years.

The investigators found that at year 3, women in the low-fat diet group had a lower risk of metabolic syndrome, but the results were not statistically significant. Of note, women in the low-fat diet group had a 19% lower odds ratio for the use of cholesterol-lowering medication after 1 year on the diet.

Although the risk of metabolic syndrome is rising in India, average dietary fat content is still lower in India than in developed countries: Population-based estimates in the United States place the average percentage of calories from fat at 32.6% for American women (CDC, 2003), while estimates for urban Indian women are at 26.4% (PLoS ONE, 2011).

Sources: Neuhouser ML, Howard B, Lu J, et al. A low-fat dietary pattern and risk of metabolic syndrome in postmenopausal women: The Women’s Health Initiative. Metabolism. May 25, 2012 [epublication ahead of print].

Sawant A, Mankeshwar R, Shah S, Raghavan R, et al. Prevalence of metabolic syndrome in urban India. Cholesterol. 2011:920983. Available at: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3114375/?tool=pubmed.

Bowen L, Ebrahim S, De Stavola B, et al. Dietary intake and rural-urban migration in India: a cross-sectional study. PLoS ONE. 2011;6(6):e14822. Available at: http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0014822#pone-0014822-t002.

Wright JD, Wang CY, Kennedy-Stephenson J, et al. Dietary intake of ten key nutrients for public health, United States: 1999–2000. Advance data from vital and health statistics; no. 334. Hyattsville, Maryland: National Center for Health Statistics. 2003. Available at: http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/ad/ad334.pdf.

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http://www.metabolismjournal.com/article/S0026-0495%2812%2900129-1/abstract
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