Rationality of the metabolic syndrome definition and criterion: a cross-sectional study in Chinese occupational population

Metabolic syndrome (MetS) was evaluated in Chinese occupational population, factor analysis using factor model and to analyze the relationship among factor loading and common chronic diseases. The samples came from a cross-sectional study at a chemical industry company in Southwest China in 2000 which included 1350 subjects, age from 20 to 89, 823 men and 529 women, 13 diabetes mellitus (DM2), 250 impaired glucose tolerance (IGT), and 20 impaired fasting glucose (IFG) by 1999 WHO diabetes diagnosis criteria. The Bivariate Pearson’s correlation coefficients were calculated to examine the relationships between variables and the principal factor analysis was performed to identify the factor model of metabolic syndrome. Logistic regression analysis was used to investigate the relationship between different factor loading and chronic diseases. A four-factor model was retained to explain the pathology and physiopathologic mechanism based on the samples, which is consistent with definition by Chinese Diabetes Society.