Redefining Cardiometabolic Risk: Comparing Metabolic Syndrome (NCEP ATP III) and Cardio-Kidney-Metabolic (CKM) Syndrome in Indonesian Adult after COVID-19 Pandemic
This study utilizing secondary data from Indonesian adults post-pandemic demonstrates that the Cardio-Kidney-Metabolic (CKM) syndrome staging framework identifies a significantly higher prevalence of at-risk individuals (94.1%) compared to traditional Metabolic Syndrome criteria (34.8%), suggesting CKM staging offers a more sensitive and clinically relevant tool for risk stratification.
Original paper licensed under CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). This is an AI-generated explanation of the paper below. It is not written or endorsed by the authors. For technical accuracy, refer to the original paper. Read full disclaimer
Imagine your body is like a bustling city. For a long time, doctors have had a specific checklist to see if the city was in trouble. They looked for five big warning signs: a belly that's too big, blood pressure that's too high, blood sugar that's too sweet, and two types of cholesterol that are out of whack. If a city had three or more of these signs, they called it "Metabolic Syndrome." It was like a red flag saying, "Hey, this city is at high risk for a traffic jam in the heart!"
But recently, scientists started wondering if that checklist was missing something important. They realized that the city's power plants (the kidneys) and the roads themselves (the heart and blood vessels) often start showing tiny cracks before the big red flags go up. So, a new, more detailed map was drawn called "Cardio-Kidney-Metabolic" or CKM syndrome. Instead of just a simple "yes or no" on a checklist, this new map uses a staging system, like levels in a video game, to catch problems earlier. The big question is: Does this new, fancy map find more people who need help than the old, classic checklist? And does it matter, especially after the world went through a global pandemic that changed how we eat and move?
This is exactly what a team of researchers in Bandung, Indonesia, decided to investigate. They took a group of 204 adults and looked at them through both lenses: the old "Metabolic Syndrome" checklist and the new "CKM" staging system. They wanted to see who got flagged by which system and if the new one was better at spotting people who were quietly struggling.
Here is what they found. When they used the old checklist (the NCEP ATP III rules), they found that 34.8% of the people in their study had Metabolic Syndrome. The main troublemakers were high blood pressure (found in 60.8% of the group), a big belly (46.1%), and low levels of the "good" cholesterol (32.4%).
However, when they switched to the new CKM map, the picture changed dramatically. Almost everyone—94.1% of the participants—was classified as being at "Stage 2" of CKM syndrome. This stage includes people who have some metabolic issues or early signs of kidney stress, even if they don't have enough symptoms to trigger the old checklist. The researchers noticed that many people who looked "fine" on the old checklist actually had tiny signs of kidney trouble, like a small amount of protein leaking into their urine (microalbuminuria), which the new system caught.
The study suggests that the old checklist might be like a security guard who only stops people carrying large, obvious weapons, while the new CKM system is like a high-tech scanner that also spots people carrying small, hidden tools that could still cause trouble. The researchers found that the new system was much better at identifying adults who were at risk, especially those with early kidney changes or subtle metabolic shifts that the old rules missed.
Interestingly, the study also looked at how they measured "obesity." The old way uses Body Mass Index (BMI), which said 42.6% of the group was obese. But when they measured body fat directly (using a method that looks at how much fat you actually carry), the number jumped to 48.5%. This hints that in this population, some people might look "normal" by height and weight but still carry too much fat, a detail the old checklist might overlook.
The authors conclude that while the old Metabolic Syndrome checklist is still useful, the new CKM staging system seems to offer a broader, more sensitive net for catching at-risk adults in Indonesia. It suggests that we might need to start looking at kidney health and early metabolic changes much sooner than we used to, rather than waiting for the big, obvious signs to appear. The study doesn't claim this is a final answer for everyone, but it strongly suggests that for Indonesian adults, this new way of looking at health risks could be a game-changer for prevention.
Drowning in papers in your field?
Get daily digests of the most novel papers matching your research keywords — with technical summaries, in your language.