Association between triglyceride glucose-body mass index and depression among US adults: A cross-sectional study

The triglyceride glucose-body mass index (TyG-BMI) is a well-established surrogate marker for insulin resistance. While an association between insulin resistance and depression has been identified, that between TyG-BMI and depression remains unclear. Therefore, we used data from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) database to investigate this.

This cross-sectional study included 9673 adults (aged ≥20 years) from the NHANES in the United States from 2011 to 2020.

Depressive symptoms were assessed using a nine-item version of the Patient Health Questionnaire. The covariates included age, sex, race/ethnicity, marital status, educational level, poverty-income ratio, smoking status, alcohol intake, diabetes status, cardiovascular disease, hypertension, physical activity, high-density lipoprotein, low-density lipoprotein, and total cholesterol. Multivariate logistic regression models, subgroup analyses, and threshold saturation effect analyses were conducted.

After adjusting for age, sex, race/ethnicity, marital status, education level, poverty-income ratio, smoking status, drinking status, diabetes status, cardiovascular disease, hypertension, physical activity, total cholesterol, high-density lipoprotein cholesterol, and low-density lipoprotein cholesterol, the threshold saturation effect showed a TyG-BMI inflection point of 174.4. Below the inflection point, a 10-unit increase in TyG-BMI was associated with a 12 % lower prevalence of depression. Above the inflection point, each 10-unit increase in TyG-BMI was associated with a 4 % increase in prevalence of depression.

TyG-BMI had a U-shaped relationship with prevalence of depression. There was a significant link between higher TyG-BMI levels and increased prevalence of depression. When the TyG-BMI value was below 174.4, any further increase in TyG-BMI was associated with a significantly lower prevalence of depression.