Metabolic Syndrome and Hypertension in Diabetic Patients

Athough a controversial issue, the Metabolic Syndrome (MS) is known to by be related to certain genetic and lifestyle factors such as hypertension. The object of this study is to evaluate the prevalence of MS and its association to hypertension among diabetic patients with and without hypertension, in the Fatemeh Zahra hospital in Najafabad, Iran. This cross-sectional descriptive study was performed on diabetic patients referring to the Fatemeh Zahra Hospital, of whom 66 subjects were randomly selected and data was obtained from their hospital files, including systolic and diastolic blood pressure, Body Mass Index (BMI), Fasting Blood Sugar (FBS), lipid profiles, waist circumference, age, sex, family history and history of diabetes. Patients with blood pressure 140/90 were considered hypertensive. MS was confirmed according to the Adult Treatment Panel (ATP) III criteria. Data was analyzed with SPSS software using the independent Student t- test, regression and chi-square, P<0.05. MS was more prevalent in hypertensive than in normotensive patients (93.3% vs 62.7%, p<0.02). Mean systolic and diastolic blood pressures were higher in MS patients than in patients without the syndrome, (136.85±25.20 vs 121.25± 28.00 and 81.63±17.00 vs 72.00±11.96 respectively). The findings of this study indicate the need for MS screening among diabetic hypertensive patients and importance of primary and secondary prevention of hypertension in order to curtail the impending epidemic of non-communicable diseases in our society.