Clinical utility of lipid ratios as potential predictors of metabolic syndrome among the elderly population: Birjand Longitudinal Aging Study (BLAS)

Abstract Background Elderly adults are at higher risk of developing metabolic syndrome (MetS). The present study aims to investigate the relationship between lipid ratios and MetS in the elderly population. Methods This study was conducted on elderly population of Birjand during 2018–2019. The data of this study was driven from Birjand Longitudinal Aging Study (BLAS). The participants were selected based on multistage stratified cluster sampling. Patients were categorized into quartiles according to the lipid ratios (TG/HDL-C, LDL-C/HDL-C, non-HDL/HDL-C), and the relationship between lipid ratio quartiles and MetS was determined by Logistic Regression using Odds Ratio. Finally, the optimal cut-off for each lipid ratio in MetS diagnosis was calculated according to the Area Under the Curve (AUC). Results This study included 1356 individuals, of whom 655 were men and 701 were women. In our study, the crude prevalence of MetS was 792 (58%), including 543 (77.5%) women and 249 (38%) men. Increasing trends were observed in quartiles of all lipid ratios for TC, LDL-C, TG, and DBP. TG/HDL was also the best lipid ratio to diagnose the MetS, based on NCEP ATP III criteria. One unit increased in level of TG/HDL resulted in 3.94 (OR: 3.94; 95%CI: 2.48–6.6) and 11.56 (OR: 11.56; 95%CI: 6.93–19.29) increasing risk of having MetS in quartile 3 and 4 compared to quartile 1, respectively. In men and women, the cutoff for TG/HDL was 3.5 and 3.0, respectively. Conclusions Our results showed that the TG/HDL-C is superior to the LDL-C/HDL-C and the non-HDL /HDL-C to predict MetS among the elderly adults.