TITLE:
The “metabolic syndrome index”: A novel, comprehensive method for evaluating the efficacy of diabetes prevention programs
AUTHORS:
Hongbin Jin, Daniel C. Benyshek
KEYWORDS:
Evaluation; Metabolic Syndrome; Type 2 Diabetes Prevention; T2D
JOURNAL NAME:
Journal of Diabetes Mellitus,
Vol.3 No.2,
May
22,
2013
ABSTRACT:
A myriad of diabetes
prevention programs are carried out worldwide to fight against the current
type 2 diabetes (T2D) pandemic. The lack of a unified criterion for evaluating
the efficacy of T2D prevention programs, however, makes the interpretation of
prevention program results difficult, and hinders clear and direct
comparisons of different prevention programs. Metabolic syndrome is a strong
indicator for diabetes and its complications, holding great promise to become
the basis of an intervention evaluation method. The Metabolic Syndrome Index
(MSI), proposed here, quantifies the metabolic risk for developing T2D and
its complications. The MSI is a novel scale for evaluating the efficacy of
diabetes prevention programs because it is a systematic, comprehensive, and
stable indicator that reflects the metabolic risk reduction for diabetes and
its complications at multiple levels and dimensions.