A total of 6,652 subjects aged 65 years or older were recruited during a routine health checkup at four MJ Health Screening Centers in Taiwan. Gender; blood pressure; body mass index; and serum levels of fasting glucose, total cholesterol (TC), high-density-lipoprotein cholesterol (HDL-C), low-density-lipoprotein cholesterol, and triglyceride were compared between subjects with subclinical hypothyroidism and hyperthyroidism.
The overall prevalences of the MetS, subclinical hyperthyroidism, and subclinical hypothyroidism were 30.4 % , 6.0 % , and 2.0 % , respectively. The prevalence of subclinical thyroid dysfunction was significantly higher among women as compared with men (9.9 % vs. 6.3 % , respectively; p < 0.05). Male subjects with subclinical hyperthyroidism had significantly lower body mass index, systolic blood pressure, TC, low-density-lipoprotein cholesterol, HDL-C, triglyceride, and number of MetS criteria than female subjects. However, no significant differences for each component of MetS, with the exception of TC and HDL-C, were found between male and female subjects with subclinical hypothyroidism.
Subclinical thyroid dysfunction would present in about 8 % of Taiwanese elderly, and about one-third of them had MetS.