Pharmacological management of metabolic syndrome and its lipid complications

Obesity epidemic has been spread all over the world in the past few decades and has caused a major public health concern due to its increasing global prevalence. Obese individuals are at higher risks of developing dyslipidemic characteristics resulting in increased triglyceride and LDL-cholesterol content and reduced HDL-cholesterol levels. This disorder has profound implications as afflicted individuals have been demonstrated to be at increased risk of development of hypertension, atherosclerosis, type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular diseases. Today, this phenotype is designated as metabolic syndrome. According to the criteria set by the International Diabetes Federation (IDF), for a patient to be diagnosed with metabolic syndrome, the person must have central obesity plus any two of the following conditions: raised TG, reduced HDL-cholesterol, raised blood pressure, and increased fasting plasma glucose. Current National Cholesterol Education Program Adult Treatment Panel III (NCEP-ATP III) guidelines for the treatment of patients with the metabolic syndrome encourage therapies that lower LDL cholesterol and TG and raise HDL-cholesterol. Primary intervention often involves treatment with statins to improve the lipid profiles of these patients. However, recent studies suggest the potential of newly identified drugs including thiazolidinediones, GLP-1 agonists, and DPP-4 inhibitors that seem to be promising in reducing the level of progression of metabolic syndrome related disorders. This review discusses the current pharmacological treatments of the metabolic syndrome with the above mentioned drugs.