Biostatistics researchers develop a metabolic syndrome severity score and web calculator

Dr. Matthew Gurka, Interim Chair, and Dr. Christa Lilly, Assistant Professor, both in Biostatistics in the School of Public Health and faculty in the Clinical Research Design, Epidemiology, and Biostatistics (CRDEB) Program of the WVCTSI, have recently developed and published equations resulting in a score that measures severity of the metabolic syndrome (MetS).  The metabolic syndrome is a cluster of interrelated risk factors that have been found to be associated with future cardiovascular disease and Type 2 diabetes.  Dr. Gurka and Dr. Mark DeBoer, a pediatric endocrinologist at the University of Virginia, have shown numerous sex and racial/ethnic differences in the presentation of MetS and its association with markers of future disease.  Drs. Gurka, Lilly, and DeBoer used data from NHANES to develop equations that account for these sex and racial/ethnic differences while providing a score that measures severity of the syndrome.  Such a score could be a useful clinical tool that allows clinicians and their patients to track progression and improvement of MetS over time, and it could serve as a useful outcome in future interventions targeting MetS. 
 
To learn more, and to utilize the web calculator that easily calculates the score, go the following link:
 
http://publichealth.hsc.wvu.edu/biostatistics/mets
 
This research was funded partially by Dr. Gurka’s NIDDK R21 (R21DK085363) and the IDeA-CTR grant from the NIGMS (U54GM104942), and the WVU HSC Information Technology Services (Travis Maynard and Timothy Broadwater) assisted with the creation of the website and calculator.