Consumption of Added Sugars and Lipid Profiles in Korean Population from a Cohort Study

Abstract

Objectives: The purpose of the study was to examine the relationship between added sugar consumption and dyslipidemia. Methods: Final study subjects consisted of 18,713 participants after the exclusion of participants with dyslipidemia or under lipid lowering medications at baseline. Added sugar levels were categorized into tertiles [men: Low <8.0 g, Middle: 8.0-21.9 g, High ≥22.0 g; women: Low <6.0 g, Middle 6.0-14.9 g, High ≥15.0 g]. Dyslipidemia was analyzed based on two of the most recent guidelines identified from the National Cholesterol Education Program Adult Treatment Panel III (NCEP ATP III) and the 2009 Korean Society of Lipidology and Atherosclerosis (KSLA). We used Kaplan-Meier and Cox proportional hazard models to estimate the hazard ratio (HR) with 95% confidence interval (CI) of dyslipidemia. Results: High added sugar was associated with hypercholesteremia (HR, 1.22; 95% CI, 1.06-1.40), high LDL cholesterolemia (1.29; 1.13-1.48), and low HDL cholesterolemia (1.26; 1.10-1.44) based on the KSLA Standard in men. In women, the high added sugar was only related to the risk for hypercholesteremia (1.26; 1.07-1.49) based on the KSLA Standard. A similar trend was shown in both men and women with application of NCEP-ATP III standard. Conclusion: In this study, an increase in added sugar consumption was associated with an increased risk of dyslipidemia in men. Additional studies assessing the association between cardiovascular and other diseases should be conducted in the future.