International Journal of Research in Medical Sciences | October 2020 | Vol 8 | Issue 10 Page 3481 International Journal of Research in Medical Sciences Njongang VN et al. Int J Res Med Sci. 2020 Oct;8(10):3481-3487 www.msjonline.org pISSN 2320-6071 | eISSN 2320-6012 Original Research Article Prevalence and components of metabolic syndrome in HIV-infected patients at the Tiko Central Clinic and Cottage Hospital in Cameroon Vigny N. Njongang 1,3 *, Assob J. C. Nguedia 1,2 , Ojong E. Walter 1 INTRODUCTION Highly active anti-retroviral therapy (HAART) used by human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) patients since the mid-1990’s has led to a significant drop in HIV related mortality. 1 Nevertheless, metabolic disorders (hypertriglyceridaemia, reduced HDL cholesterol, abdominal obesity, hypertension, and insulin resistance) jointly termed metabolic syndrome is linked to HIV and HAART and associated with elevated cardiovascular disease risk in these patients as they age. 2 A systematic review and meta-analysis study conducted in South Africa by Olamide and associates recently demonstrated that the prevalence of metabolic syndrome in sub-Saharan Africa is 12% for HIV-uninfected individuals and 21.5% for HIV infected subjects and this difference is statistically significant. 3 This study further mentioned that most studies in Africa have reported hypertension and high triglycerides as common components of metabolic syndrome among HIV-infected patients. 3 Kim et al in another systematic review and meta-analysis study conducted in Africa in 2016 revealed 1 Department of Medical Laboratory Sciences, 2 Department of Biomedical Sciences, University of Buea, Buea, Cameroon 3 Department of Medical Laboratory Sciences, Maflekumen Higher Institute of Health Sciences Tiko, Tiko, Cameroon Received: 02 August 2020 Accepted: 05 September 2020 *Correspondence: Vigny N. Njongang, E-mail: N.Vigny64@gmail.com Copyright: © the author(s), publisher and licensee Medip Academy. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial License, which permits unrestricted non-commercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. ABSTRACT Background: HAART and HIV related metabolic syndrome (MS) is associated with increased cardiovascular risk in aging HIV patients. This study was aimed at comparing the prevalence of MS between HIV-infected patients on HAART and apparently healthy HIV-uninfected individuals and identifying key MS components in these groups of subjects. Methods: This was a hospital-based case-control study. The cases were HIV sero-positive individuals on HAART for at least 6 months and controls were HIV sero-negative individuals. Results: 74/135 (54.8%) participants were females amongst which 53/75 (70.7%) and 21/60 (35%) were in the test and control groups respectively. The prevalence of MS was insignificantly higher in HIV-infected patients on HAART than in control subjects according to the IDF (22.7% versus 20%, p=0.834) and NCEP ATP III criteria (18.7% versus 18.3%, p=1.000) respectively. The most prevalent components of MS in HIV-infected patients on HAART were low HDL-c (100%), abdominal obesity (IDF: 68%, ATP III: 32%), and hypertension (28%). Multivariate analysis of MS components in HIV-infected patients on HAART revealed that hypertension (OR: 15.996, 95% CI: 3.385-75.585; p≤0.001) and high blood glucose (OR: 10.760, 95% CI: 1.642-70.505; p=0.013) were associated with MS. Significantly more HIV-infected females were seen with abdominal obesity than HIV-infected males (86.8% versus 4.5%, p≤0.001). Conclusions: Abdominal obesity is a driving component of MS in HIV-infected patients particularly among females and hypertension is a prevalent and predictor component of MS among HIV patients. Keywords: Cardiovascular disease, Components, HAART, HIV, Metabolic syndrome, Prevalence DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.18203/2320-6012.ijrms20204220