Waistline to thigh circumference ratio as a predictor of MAFLD: a health care worker study with 2-year follow-up

This study aimed to determine whether the waist-to-thigh ratio (WTTR) is associated with the incidence of metabolic-associated fatty liver disease (MAFLD) in health care workers. There were 4517 health care workers with baseline data and results from 2 follow-up examinations. We divided the subjects into 3 groups according to baseline WTTR and used the Cox hazard regression model to estimate MAFLD risk. The WTTRs were categorized by tertiles at baseline using the values 1.58 and 1.66. Patients with higher WTTR tended to have significantly greater values for the following factors, body mass index (BMI), fasting blood glucose (FPG), systolic blood pressure, diastolic blood pressure, total cholesterol (TC), triglycerides (TG), low-density lipoprotein-cholesterol (LDL-C) and neck circumference. The incidence of MAFLD significantly increased with increasing WTTR tertiles (5.74%, 12.75% and 22.25% for the first, second and third tertiles, respectively, P 23 kg/m2, the associations between WTTR and MAFLD incidence were more pronounced in subjects with a BMI