Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health 2014, 11(5), 5497-5509; doi:10.3390/ijerph110505497
Elevated White Blood Cell Count Is Associated with Higher Risk of Glucose Metabolism Disorders in Middle-Aged and Elderly Chinese People
1
Department of Endocrinology, Chinese People's Liberation Army (PLA) General Hospital, 28 Fuxing Road, Beijing 100853, China
2
Department of Endocrinology, The First Affiliated Hospital, Chinese People's Liberation Army (PLA) General Hospital, 51 Fucheng Road, Beijing 100048, China
3
Department of Health Statistics, Fourth Military Medical University, 169 Changle West Road, Xi'an 710032, China
†
These authors contributed equally to this work.
*
Author to whom correspondence should be addressed.
Received: 4 April 2014 / Revised: 12 May 2014 / Accepted: 13 May 2014 / Published: 20 May 2014
Abstract
White blood cell (WBC) count has been associated with diabetic risk, but whether the correlation is independent of other risk factors has hardly been studied. Moreover, very few such studies with large sample sizes have been conducted in Chinese. Therefore, we investigated the relationship between WBC count and glucose metabolism in china. We also examined the relevant variables of WBC count. A total of 9,697 subjects (mean age, 58.0 ± 9.1 years) were recruited. The subjects were classified into four groups, including subjects with normal glucose tolerance, isolated impaired fasting glucose, impaired glucose tolerance and type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM). We found that WBC count increased as glucose metabolism disorders exacerbated. WBC count was also positively correlated with waist hip ratio, body mass index, smoking, triglycerides, glycosylated haemoglobin A1c (HbA1c) and 2-h postprandial glucose. In addition, high density lipoprotein and the female gender were inversely correlated with WBC count. In patients with previously diagnosed T2DM, the course of T2DM was not correlated with WBC count. Our findings indicate that elevated WBC count is independently associated with worsening of glucose metabolism in middle-aged and elderly Chinese. In addition, loss of weight, smoking cessation, lipid-modifying therapies, and control of postprandial plasma glucose and HbA1c may ameliorate the chronic low-grade inflammation. View Full-TextKeywords:
white blood cell; diabetes mellitus, type 2; glucose metabolism disorders; inflammation; glycosylated hemoglobin A1c
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Jiang, H.; Yan, W.-H.; Li, C.-J.; Wang, A.-P.; Dou, J.-T.; Mu, Y.-M. Elevated White Blood Cell Count Is Associated with Higher Risk of Glucose Metabolism Disorders in Middle-Aged and Elderly Chinese People. Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health 2014, 11, 5497-5509.
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