But do such individuals, in turn, face a lower risk for heart failure than non-obese men and women who nonetheless struggle with the tell-tale signs of metabolic syndrome?
To explore the question, the research team tracked 550 men and women for an average of six years.
The patients were enlisted between 2003 and 2005, and none had a history of diabetes or signs of cardiac illness at the study launch.
Questionnaires were completed at the launch to gather information on health status, weight and body mass index, physical activity habits, and those factors that fall under the rubric of a metabolic syndrome evaluation.
As expected, the team found that about half of the participants had metabolic syndrome, and that obese patients were more likely to have it than those who were of normal weight or just overweight.
That said, the authors drilled down on the health status of those 185 patients, with an average age of just under 60, who ultimately experienced heart failure during the study period.
The results: heart failure risk appeared to be much higher among patients with metabolic syndrome than among those without, regardless of weight status. And, obese patients without metabolic syndrome were found to experience the lowest heart failure incidence rate of any category of patients.
For example, among patients who were not diagnosed with metabolic syndrome, heart failure incidence was roughly 9 percent among obese men and women, 14 percent among overweight patients, and 16 percent among those of normal weight.
This compared very favorably with patients who did have the metabolic syndrome. Among that group, heart failure incidence was much higher, hitting approximately 54 percent among the obese, 48 percent among the overweight, and 63 percent among those of normal weight.
The four metabolic syndrome fact
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