Management of cardiovascular risk associated with insulin resistance, diabetes, and the metabolic syndrome.

The metabolic syndrome is a cluster of symptoms that function as risk factors for cardiovascular disease (CVD), and its key components--diabetes, dyslipidemia, and hypertension--form a lethal combination. The incidence of obesity and other components of the metabolic syndrome is now at epidemic proportions, and current lifestyle trends suggest that it will continue to increase worldwide. In order to avert a major health crisis, physicians must take immediate steps to recognize and treat the metabolic syndrome and its components. Early diagnosis and therapeutic lifestyle changes should go hand-in-hand with individual and composite therapy for metabolic syndrome components to reduce CVD risk in affected individuals. This review provides a comprehensive overview of the diagnosis and treatment of the metabolic syndrome with a particular emphasis on reducing CVD risk.