In this large prospective study derived from the Women’s Health Study, the authors found that the presence of traditional metabolic syndrome-related risk factors, either individually or jointly, increased the risk of developing cardiovascular disease (CVD) independent of body mass index (BMI). Moreover, this increased CVD risk due to the presence of the metabolic syndrome (defined using modified National Cholesterol Education Program-Adult Treatment Program III criteria) was independent of other conventional CVD risk factors and was not explained by increased C-reactive protein (CRP). Although CRP provided additional prognostic information beyond BMI and the metabolic syndrome, it did not fully account for the high risk of CVD associated with the metabolic syndrome. According to the authors, these findings suggest that the metabolic syndrome may be a more important determinant in CVD risk prediction than the assessment of overall obesity, especially in older people. They concluded that the metabolic syndrome may largely explain the increased risk of CVD associated with BMI in apparently healthy women.
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