Associations of serum uric acid levels with cardiovascular health factors: differences by sex, age and body mass index in Chinese participants.
BACKGROUND
Recently, the American Heart Association developed a set of 3 ideal cardiovascular (CV) health factors. However, information on whether associations of uric acid (UA) with the CV health factors is influenced by sex, age, and body mass index (BMI) is limited.


METHODS
We conducted a cross-sectional analysis using a cohort of 10,420 people aged 20-100 years, who underwent health checkups in 2009. CV health factors were defined as untreated total cholesterol (TC)<200mg/dl, untreated systolic/diastolic blood pressure (BP)<120/80 mm Hg, and untreated fasting plasma glucose (FPG)<100mg/dl.


RESULTS
The association of UA with each CV health factor was gender-specific. The interaction terms (gender × UA level) comparing change in prevalence of each CV health factor between the 1st and 4th UA quartiles showed a significantly greater reduction among women (all P<0.01). In addition, the interactions between UA levels and age on prevalence of each CV health factor were statistically significant (all P<0.01). Furthermore, absolute reductions in the prevalence of ideal levels of BP, and TC across ordinal UA quartiles were greater in obese individuals than in overweight and normal-weight individuals (all P<0.01). Finally, UA showed a bell-curved relation with the prevalence of ideal FPG among all BMI categories.


CONCLUSIONS
Elevated UA inversely associated with each CV health factor and these associations were influenced by gender, age and BMI. Elevated UA levels should alert clinical suspicion for a potential coexistence of low frequency of CV health factors.
Department of Endocrinology, Tongji Hospital, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430030, China.
Tingting
T
Du
Department of Anesthesiology, School of Stomatology, Fourth Military Medical University, Xi'an 710032, China.
Xingxing
X
Sun
Department of Health Examination, Wuhan Iron and Steel Company (WISCO) General Hospital, Wuhan 430080, China.
Huiming
H
Lu
Department of Endocrinology, Wuhan Iron and Steel Company (WISCO) General Hospital, Wuhan 430080, China.
Xuan
X
Lin
Department of Endocrinology, Tongji Hospital, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430030, China.
Qian
Q
Liu
Department of Endocrinology, Tongji Hospital, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430030, China.
Rui
R
Huo
Department of Endocrinology, Tongji Hospital, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430030, China. Electronic address: xuefengyu188@gmail.com.
Xuefeng
X
Yu
D000328:Adult; D000367:Age Factors; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D015992:Body Mass Index; D002318:Cardiovascular Diseases / Q000097:blood* / Q000453:epidemiology; D002681:China / Q000453:epidemiology; D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D015995:Prevalence; D012737:Sex Factors; D014527:Uric Acid / Q000097:blood*; D055815:Young Adult
D014527:Uric Acid
Blood pressure; Fasting plasma glucose; Total cholesterol; Uric acid