Metabolically Healthy Obesity and Carotid Plaque among Steelworkers in North China: The Role of Inflammation

This study aimed to investigate the association between metabolically healthy obesity (MHO) and carotid plaque. In this cross-sectional survey, 3467 steelworkers in North China were surveyed. There are two criteria for defining a carotid plaque: (1) the lesion structure exceeds 50% of the peripheral intima-media thickness value or invades the arterial lumen by at least 0.5 mm; (2) a thickness > 1.5 mm from the intima–lumen interface to the media–adventitia interface. Metabolic health was defined as the nonexistence of one of the metabolic syndrome (MetS) diagnostic criteria for metabolic abnormalities. Obesity was defined as having a BMI ≥ 25 kg/m(2). To calculate the odds ratio (OR) for the prevalence carotid plaque, a logistic regression was used for the analysis. The prevalence of carotid plaque in the subjects was 14.3% for metabolically healthy non-obesity (MHNO), 32.4% for MHO, 18.9% for metabolically unhealthy non-obesity (MUNO), and 46.8% for metabolically unhealthy obesity (MUO). The odds ratios for suffering from carotid plaque were 1.27 (95% CI: 0.69 to 2.32) for MHO, 1.83 (95% CI: 1.29 to 2.58) for MUNO, and 1.81 (1.28 to 2.56) for MUO in comparison with MHNO after adjusting for confounders. There was no association between the MHO phenotype and carotid plaque prevalence among steelworkers in North China.