The evaluation of metabolic syndrome in patients diagnosed with non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD): a cross-sectional study of Iranian population

Our study is assessing the epidemiological aspects of nonalcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) in Iranian population and evaluates the relationship between NAFLD and metabolic syndrome.

We conducted this cross-sectional study on 145 subjects who were diagnosed with NAFLD and referred to the Gastroenterology clinics of Ghaem Hospital, Mashhad, Iran in the year of 2013. Using ultrasonography method, we diagnosed NAFLD as a fatty liver manifestation in the absence of other liver complications. We used National Cholesterol Education Program Adult Treatment Panel III criteria (ATPIII) as a guideline to establish metabolic syndrome diagnosis.

Metabolic syndrome had an overall prevalence of 49.7% among our subjects. The results showed no difference in mean AST and ALT levels between the groups of patients with and without metabolic syndrome. Our results were unable to maintain an association between our targeted liver enzymes (AST and ALT) and different features of metabolic syndrome. In multivariate linear regression models, the presence of metabolic syndrome was unable to predict AST (p=0.631, r2=0.002) or ALT (p=0.122, r2=0.017) abnormalities.

The present study has shown a high prevalence of metabolic syndrome in Iranian patients who diagnosed with NAFLD. Contrary to previous reports, despite the high prevalence of metabolic syndrome conditions in NAFLD patients, we found that the presence of metabolic syndrome had not increased the risk of NAFLD in the population undergone our study.