Lactation duration and lifetime progression to metabolic syndrome in women according to their history of gestational diabetes: a prospective longitudinal community-based cohort study

BACKGROUND: Despite the many signs of progress in pharmacotherapies, metabolic syndrome (MetS) is one of the main public-health burdens worldwide. Our study aimed to compare the effect of breastfeeding (BF) in women with and without gestational diabetes mellitus (GDM) on MetS incidence. METHODS: Of females who participated in the Tehran Lipid and glucose study, women who met our inclusion criteria were selected. The Cox proportional hazards regression model, with adjustment of potential confounders, was done to evaluate the relationship between duration of BF and incident of MetS in women with a GDM history compared to non-GDM. RESULTS: Out of 1176 women, there were 1001 non-GDM and 175 GDM. The median follow-up was 16.3 (11.9, 19.3) years. Results of the adjusted model illustrated that the total BF duration was negatively associated with MetS incidence risk (hazard ratio (HR) 0.98, 95% CI 0.98–0.99) in total participants indicating that per one-month increase of BF duration, the hazard of MetS reduced by 2%. The HR of MetS in Comparison between GDM and non-GDM women demonstrated significantly more reduced MetS incidence with a longer duration of exclusive BF (HR 0.93, 95% CI 0.88–0.98). CONCLUSIONS: Our findings illustrated the protective effect of BF, especially exclusive BF, on MetS incidence risk. BF is more effective in reducing the risk of MetS among women with a history of GDM than among women without such a history. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s12967-023-04005-w.