Alcohol consumption and the metabolic syndrome in Korean adults: the 1998 Korean National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey.

BACKGROUND The metabolic syndrome is associated with a high risk of cardiovascular disease morbidity and mortality. Light and moderate alcohol consumption have been associated with reduced cardiovascular disease morbidity and mortality. OBJECTIVE This study was performed to examine the association between alcohol consumption and the metabolic syndrome. DESIGN The study sample comprised 7962 Korean adults (3597 men, 4365 women) who had participated in the 1998 Korean National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey. RESULTS The prevalence of the metabolic syndrome was 20.8% in men and 26.9% in women. The adjusted odds ratio for the metabolic syndrome in the group consuming 1-14.9 g alcohol/d was 0.71 (95% CI: 0.53, 0.95) in men and 0.80 (95% CI: 0.65, 0.98) in women. Alcohol consumption had a significant inverse relation with the odds ratio for low HDL cholesterol in all alcohol groups. Heavy alcohol consumption (> or =30 g/d) was associated with significantly higher odds ratios for high blood pressure and high triacylglycerol in men and high fasting blood glucose and high triacylglycerol in women. Odds ratios for the metabolic syndrome and its components tended to increase with increasing alcohol consumption. The dose-response relation of the odds ratio between alcohol consumption and the clustering of > or =3 risk factors was significant in both the high and low HDL-cholesterol groups. CONCLUSIONS Although alcohol consumption had a significant inverse relation with the odds ratio for low HDL cholesterol in all alcohol groups, an increasing dose-response relation was found between alcohol consumption and the odds ratio for the metabolic syndrome. This might be due to the opposite relation of alcohol consumption to other components of the metabolic syndrome.