ZJU index and the risk of nonalcoholic fatty liver disease in the Uygur population in the rural area of Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region： A cohort study / 临床肝胆病杂志

ABSTRACT

ObjectiveTo investigate the association between ZJU index and the onset of nonalcoholic fatty liver disease （NAFLD） in the Uygur population and the value of ZJU index in predicting the risk of NAFLD. MethodsThe Uighur community of The 51st Regiment of The Third Division of Xinjiang Kashgar Corps was selected as the investigation site， and the Uygur residents who lived in this area and had an age of >18 years were selected as subjects. Follow-up studies were conducted in 2019， 2020， and 2021， and the investigation of outcomes was completed in June to August of 2021. Finally 10 597 subjects were enrolled for analysis. The Kruskal-Wallis H test was used for comparison of continuous variables between groups， and the chi-square test was used for comparison of categorical variables between groups. The subjects were divided into Q1-Q4 groups according to the level of ZJU index. The Kaplan-Meier curve was used to predict the incidence rate of NAFLD， and the Cox regression model was used to analyze the association between ZJU index and the risk of NAFLD； the area under the ROC curve （AUC） was used to evaluate the value of ZJU index in predicting the risk of NAFLD. ResultsDuring the median follow-up time of 4.92 years， the incidence rate of NAFLD was 9.4% （992/10 597） among the study population. After adjustment for multiple factors， there was a significant increase in the risk of NAFLD with the increase in ZJU index， with a hazard ratio of 2.55 （95% confidence interval ［CI］： 1.60‍ — ‍4.06）， 7.32 （95%CI： 4.78‍ — ‍11.20）， and 21.74 （95%CI： 14.32‍ — ‍33.00）， respectively （all Ptrend<0.001）. The ROC curve showed that ZJU index had a higher value in predicting NAFLD （AUC=0.816）， and the male subgroup had a significantly higher predictive accuracy of ZJU index than the female subgroup （AUC： 0.829 vs 0.809）. ConclusionZJU index is a predictive factor for the onset of NAFLD in the Uygur population in rural areas of Xinjiang and has a good value in predicting the risk of NAFLD.