Increased Prevalence of Metabolic Syndrome in Individuals with Osteoarthritis: An Analysis of NHANES III Data

AbstractBackground: Osteoarthritis (OA) and cardiovascular disease (CVD) share age and obesity as risk factors, but may also be linked by pathogenic mechanisms involving metabolic abnormalities and systemic inflammation. This study compared the prevalence of OA and metabolic syndrome (MetS) in subjects with OA versus the general population without OA to determine whether having OA predicts increased cardiovascular risk. Methods: National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey III data were used as a representative sample of the general US population. Subjects included adults aged ≥ 18 years with records of history, physical, radiographic, and laboratory data adequate to assess for diagnoses of MetS and OA. Logistic regression was used to examine the association between MetS and population-weighted variables. Results: The general population sample included 7714 subjects (weighted value representing 174.9 million population), of whom 975 subjects had OA (weighted value 17.5 million) and 6739 did not (weigh...