Metabolic Syndrome in Patients with Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease in Medicine Department of a Tertiary Care Hospital: A Descriptive Cross-sectional Study

INTRODUCTION: The best recognized systemic manifestations of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease include, cardiovascular co-morbidities, cachexia and muscle dysfunction, osteoporosis, anemia, and clinical depression and anxiety. This study was undertaken to find the prevalence of the metabolic syndrome in chronic obstructive pulmonary disease patients who were admitted in the medicine department of a tertiary care hospital. METHODS: A descriptive cross-sectional study was carried out in the medicine department of Nepal Medical College and teaching hospital between October 2009 and January 2010. Ethical approval was taken from the Intitutional Review Committee. Convenience sampling technique was used. All chronic obstructive pulmonary disease patients were included. Descriptive statistics were used to evaluate baseline characteristics. Point estimate at 90% Confidence Interval was calculated along with frequency and proportion for binary data. RESULTS: Out of 84 patients, the period prevalence of metabolic syndrome is 30 (35.71%) (29.80-40.20 at 90% Confidence Interval) as per the definition by International Diabetes Federation 2006 for South Asians. Among them, 35 (41.67%) were male and 49 (58.33% ) were female. Eight (9.5%) were of age between 40-49 years, 11 (13.1%) between 50-59 years, 27 (32.1%) between 60-69 years and 38 (45.2%) of 70 years and above. CONCLUSIONS: The study showed that the prevalence of metabolic syndrome was found to be lower than the previous study done in similar settings.