Metabolic syndrome components in patients with autosomal-dominant polycystic kidney disease

The aim of this work was to compare the prevalence of the metabolic syndrome (MS) and its components between a group of autosomal-dominant polycystic kidney disease (ADPKD) patients with normal kidney function and no prior diagnosis of diabetes and healthy controls.

Forty-nine patients with ADPKD (age 35.9 +/- 11.1 years) with serum creatinine <1.35 mg/dl and 50 healthy controls (36.7 +/- 9.2 years) were enrolled for the study. Physical examination, basic laboratory measurements and oral glucose tolerance test were performed in all subjects.

In the group of ADPKD patients, when compared to controls, the following values were significantly higher: waist-to-hip ratio (0.84 +/- 0.09 vs. 0.81 +/- 0.10, p = 0.046), systolic blood pressure (133.9 +/- 19.8 vs. 122.2 +/- 14.9 mm Hg, p = 0.0023), diastolic blood pressure (92.9 +/- 12.4 vs. 82.9 +/- 9.3 mm Hg, p < 0.0001), fasting glycemia (91.6 +/- 10.5 vs. 84.5 +/- 9.2 mg/dl, p = 0.04), and HbA(1C) (5.41 +/- 0.35 vs. 5.28 +/- 0.33%, p = 0.06, borderline significance). Adult Treatment Panel III criteria of MS were fulfilled by 14% of patients and 14% of controls, while International Diabetes Federation criteria were fulfilled by 22% of patients and 20% of controls, without any significant difference between the groups.

The presence of ADPKD with normal kidney function is associated with components of MS such as hypertension, abdominal obesity and higher fasting glycemia.