Objective: To evaluate the association between calcaneus bone mineral density (BMD) and metabolic syndrome (MS).
Methods: A cross-sectional study was carried out in 5 552 subjects with 1 987 men and 3 565 women (age:40-87 years old). MS was defined according to Chinese Diabetes Society criteria. BMD was assessed by quantitative ultrasound.
Results: The proportion of MS was 29.0% in male and 24.4% in female. There were no differences in BMD between MS and non-MS subjects in both genders. Linear trend analysis displayed that BMD was positively associated with the increase of MS components in post-menopausal women after adjustment of age, ALT, creatinine and exercises (P < 0.05). Moreover, multiple regression analysis showed that BMD was inversely correlated with age (β = -0.034, P < 0.001) and positively correlated with BMI (β = 0.046, P = 0.001) , TG (β = 0.066, P = 0.034) and systolic blood pressure (SBP) (β = 0.007, P = 0.039) in post-menopausal women with MS.
Conclusions: BMD tended to increase with the numbers of MS components in post-menopausal women. It was positively correlated with BMI, TG and SBP in postmenopausal women with MS.