ABSTRACT
A cluster of insulin resistance, dyslipidemia and hypertension has been labeled as a metabolic syndrome. Asians have a lower rate of obesity than Caucasians, but have recently become increasingly prone to obesity and the metabolic syndrome, especially in rural communities in Japan. Although weight loss has been considered to be effective for improvement of the metabolic syndrome, most data are based on studies in Western countries with only limited information derived from Japanese populations. We conducted a study of 188 subjects who participated in our interventional program for obesity based on health education and self-determination in 2000-2003. The intervention induced significant decreases in caloric intakes and increases in physical activity in the participants, and then resulted in a significant 1.3kg reduction in weight on the average. Weght-loss was significantly associated with indexes of obesity, values of total cholesterol, triglyceide and HDL cholesterol levels, but was not related with blood pressure and LDL cholesterol, which were significantly decreased by our intervention. Furthermore a simple regression analysis was carried out to verify whether weight loss and metabolic syndrome parameters were related. Weight loss was determinantsexplaining less than a total of 10% of the variance in triglyceride and total cholesterol for the participants. Future studies of weight loss for metabolic syndrome should incorporate Asian ethnic factors, such as dietary habits and genetic influences.