Abstract Body: Background:
Poverty is an important determinant of health leading to barriers in healthcare access, inadequate nutrition, and challenges in managing chronic diseases. We sought to investigate associations between poverty and cardiometabolic risk factors using contemporary data from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) 2017-2020 cycle.
Methods:
The study included non-pregnant adults aged 18 years and older from the 2017-2020 NHANES. Poverty income ratio (PIR) was defined as the ratio of income to poverty threshold. Generalized linear models adjusted for age, sex and body-mass index (BMI) were employed to investigate the association of poverty income ratio and cardiometabolic risk factors with statistical significance set at p<0.05.
Results:
The 13,137 participants were a mean 49 (18) years old, (51% female). In models adjusted for age, sex and BMI, increased poverty (lower PIR) was associated with cardiometabolic risk factors including: liver stiffness (β= -0.0116 95% CI [-0.0189, -0.0043]), p= 0.002), systolic blood pressure β= -0.008 95% CI [-0.01, -0.006], p < 0.0001) lower HDL (β= 0.0096 95% CI [0.0070, 0.0123, p<0.0001) higher levels of high-sensitive CRP β= -0.0124 95% CI[-0.0172, -0.0076, p<0.0001 ) higher hemoglobin A1c (β= -0.1272 95% CI [-0.1630, -0.0913, p<0.0001) and more prevalent congestive heart failure, stroke and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (p < 0.0001 for all) (Table).
Conclusion:
This study demonstrates strong associations between poverty and cardiometabolic risk factors. Individuals with increasing poverty had higher blood pressures, worse cholesterol and metabolic measures and more systemic inflammation. These findings underscore the need for public health interventions targeting cardiometabolic health in socioeconomically disadvantaged populations.