One in three urban Indian adults has metabolic syndrome. By age 50, the prevalence climbs past 40%. Most of them do not know it \u2014 because metabolic syndrome rarely shows up as a single dramatic symptom. It quietly raises your risk of heart attack, stroke, and type 2 diabetes by 2\u20135\u00d7 while you continue to “feel fine.”<\/p>\n
India has the highest metabolic syndrome burden in the world, and the diagnosis criteria built for Caucasian bodies underestimate the Indian risk. This guide explains what metabolic syndrome actually is, who has it in India, how it is diagnosed differently for Indians, and what to do about it.<\/p>\n
Metabolic syndrome is not a disease in itself. It is a cluster of five risk factors<\/strong> that, when three or more occur together, dramatically raise your risk of cardiovascular disease, type 2 diabetes, and stroke.<\/p>\n The five factors:<\/p>\n Three of these five = metabolic syndrome. The diagnostic criteria are from the International Diabetes Federation and the National Cholesterol Education Programme (ATP III).<\/p>\n The waist circumference thresholds were originally set for European populations. Indians, with our “thin-fat” phenotype, accumulate visceral fat<\/a> and develop insulin resistance at lower waist measurements than Caucasians. The IDF has issued separate Asian-specific cutoffs:<\/p>\n\n
<\/span>Why India has different (stricter) thresholds<\/span><\/h2>\n