Metabolic syndrome: an increased risk among adolescents exposed to cigarette smoke

Exposure to cigarette smoke, whether it is active or passive smoking, multiplied by about four the likelihood that adolescents develop metabolic syndrome, particularly if they are already in a situation of overweight or nearly becoming, U.S. researchers report in the journal "Circulation".

According to Dr. Michael Weitzman, Faculty of Medicine and Dentistry at the University of Rochester in New York, and colleagues, this study aims to demonstrate, based on the analysis of a biological marker smoking, that exposure to cigarette smoke increases in a dose-dependent risk of developing metabolic syndrome in adolescents.

The term metabolic syndrome encompasses a myriad of disorders predisposing to the development of diabetes or cardiovascular disorders such as hypertension, dyslipidemia and elevated blood sugar. Lack of consensus on the precise definition of the syndrome, the authors considered that they were faced with a metabolic syndrome when at least three of the following conditions were met: a high triglycerides, low HDL-cholesterol ( the "good" cholesterol), abdominal obesity, high blood pressure or high blood sugar.

Their study involved analyzing the data collected in the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (a national epidemiological study renewed at regular intervals) between 1988 and 1994 to 2273 adolescents aged 12 to 19 years. In addition to the data on cardiovascular risk factors in possibly combined with metabolic syndrome, they took into account blood levels of cotinine (a metabolite of nicotine derivative) to confirm exposure to cigarette smoke for each participant. The lowest (0.05 to 15 ng / ml) concentrations reflect a situation of passive smoking and the highest (more than 15 ng / ml) corresponded to a state of active smoking

Their calculations showed that the metabolic syndrome could be identified in 1.2% of adolescents not exposed to cigarette smoke, 5.4% of participants exposed to secondhand smoke and in 8.7% of young smokers.

This increased risk of developing metabolic syndrome for increasing exposure to cigarette smoke was even more marked among young people considered, according to their body size, as being at risk of becoming obese. Indeed, the proportion of adolescents in this situation with metabolic syndrome were respectively 5.6%, 19.6% and 23.6% depending on the degree of exposure to cigarette smoke.

This excess risk was manifested even more important for participants already suffers from overweight, with percentages of adolescents with metabolic syndrome amounting to 23.8%, 32.3% and 40 , 4%, as they were non-smokers exposed to passive smoking or smoking themselves.

Based on this analysis, being exposed to passive smoking multiplies by 4.7 the risk of developing metabolic syndrome compared to unexposed to smoke cigarettes person, while a state of active smoking multiplies by 6.1.

Smoking and obesity, already identified as major factors and preventable mortality risk, so also are two independent risk factors for the occurrence of metabolic syndrome among adolescents, the authors conclude. As the obesity epidemic continues to grow in the United States and a significant portion of this population continues to be exposed to cigarette smoke in spite of the progress made in this area, these results indicate that a number growing young Americans is particularly likely to develop metabolic syndrome and therefore then be faced with cardiovascular disease occurring early and the onset of diabetes type 2