The Risk of Metabolic Syndrome According to the White Blood Cell Count in Apparently Healthy Korean Adults

PURPOSE: Considerable amount of interest has been focused on the positive relationship between inflammation and the metabolic syndrome (MS). However, few studies have been performed to evaluate the relationship between baseline white blood cell (WBC) count and future risk for developing MS. Therefore, we investigated whether the baseline plasma levels of WBC count could be associated with future risk for MS in apparently healthy Korean. MATERIALS AND METHODS: A total of 1135 subjects (781 men and 354 women with a mean age of 49 years), who underwent health examinations at Kangbuk Samsung Hospital in both 2002 and 2005 were enrolled. The presence of MS was defined using the modified criteria of the National Cholesterol Education Program Adult Treatment Panel III using BMI instead of waist circumference. RESULTS: The baseline levels of WBC count were significantly higher among incident MS cases than among subjects without MS. The relative risks of incident MS were 1.4, 3.2 and 2.7 for WBC quartiles 2, 3, and 4, respectively, when compared with the first quartile (p-value for trend <0.001). These positive associations persisted after adjustment for baseline body mass index, blood pressure, fasting glucose, high density lipoprotein-cholesterol, triglyceride and homeostatic model assessment-insulin resistance; adjusted relative risk of incident MS for the 2nd, 3rd and 4th quartile groups vs. the lowest quartile were 1.2, 2.4 and 1.7, respectively (p-value for trend =0.011). CONCLUSION: This retrospective cohort study suggests that an elevated WBC count could be associated with incident MS, suggesting that baseline inflammation mirrored by WBC level can impact future MS development.