In 3,469 Adults, Fatty Liver Prevalence Was 23.0% in the Low-BMI, High Waist-to-Height Group Versus 6.2% in the Low-Low Group
A study published November 14 in Scientific Reports retrospectively analysed 3,469 adults who attended routine health examinations at Fusui County People's Hospital, evaluating the phenotyping value of the waist-to-height ratio (WHtR) for fatty liver, which was detected by ultrasound.
Ultrasound-detected fatty liver was present in 839 participants, or 24.2 percent. Among the 1,933 participants with a body mass index below 24 kg/m2, those with a WHtR of 0.5 or above represented 11.0 percent of the BMI stratum but accounted for 31.4 percent of its fatty liver cases.
The prevalence of ultrasound-detected fatty liver was 23.0 percent in this group, compared with 6.2 percent among participants with both low BMI and low WHtR. After adjustment for age, sex and the triglyceride-glucose (TyG) index, the prevalence ratio for the low-BMI, high-WHtR phenotype was 2.63 (95% CI 1.90-3.63).
On individual-level discrimination, adding TyG to BMI increased the cross-validated ROC AUC from 0.837 to 0.865. Adding WHtR to BMI plus TyG increased the AUC to 0.867, a paired difference of 0.00163 (95% CI -0.00009 to 0.00337), with no clear improvement in precision-recall AUC or Brier score.
The authors conclude that WHtR identified a high-prevalence phenotype among adults below the BMI overweight threshold, but yielded little further discrimination beyond BMI plus TyG, and that these single-centre cross-sectional data do not support using WHtR alone as a screening threshold to guide liver ultrasound referrals. The study received no external funding.
Source: Scientific
Published by GSM · USA (original Chinese edition)
Photo: 图：医务人员为受检者做腹部超声检查。来源：Goleisureintl，Wikimedia Commons，CC BY 4.0。 / Photo: A health worker performing an abdominal ultrasound examination. Source: Goleisureintl, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 4.0.
