Association between white blood cell count and non-alcoholic fatty liver disease in urban Han Chinese: a prospective cohort study.
OBJECTIVES
The white blood cell (WBC) count is a simple and convenient marker of inflammation for use in medical practice; however, its association with non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) has not been determined. We examined the relationship between WBC and NAFLD to provide a convenient and useful marker for the prediction of NAFLD.


SETTING
A longitudinal cohort participating in a large health check-up programme for the Chinese population was selected and followed up from 2005 to 2011.


PARTICIPANTS
A total of 21 307 male and female participants without NAFLD who underwent health check-ups at least twice between 2005 and 2011 were included in this study. 15 201 participants (7286 men and 7915 women) were eligible for inclusion.


RESULTS
The baseline distribution of age, WBC, body mass index (BMI), systolic blood pressure (SBP), diastolic blood pressure (DBP), fasting plasma glucose (FPG), total cholesterol (TC), triglyceride (TG), high-density lipoprotein cholesterol (HDL-C), low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL-C), serum total protein (TP), albumin (ALB) and globin (GLO) and the prevalence of males, hypertension, hyperglycaemia, smoking and regular exercise were significantly different between the incident NAFLD and non-NAFLD groups (p<0.05). Cox proportional hazards regression analysis was performed to estimate the HRs and 95% CIs of WBC, which predicted the occurrence of NAFLD. Compared with the lowest WBC quartile (Q1), the HRs and 95% CIs of the other WBC quartiles (Q2, Q3 and Q4) for incident NAFLD were 1.090 (0.978 to 1.215), 1.174 (1.055 to 1.305) and 1.152 (1.035 to 1.281), respectively, after adjusting for age, gender, smoking, regular exercise, BMI, hypertension, hyperglycaemia, TC, TG, HDL-C, LDL-C, ALB and GLO.


CONCLUSIONS
Our study clearly showed that WBC count was a significant factor associated with incident NAFLD in Han Chinese.
['Wang|Shukang|S|', 'Zhang|Chengqi|C|', 'Zhang|Guang|G|', 'Yuan|Zhongshang|Z|', 'Liu|Yanxun|Y|', 'Ding|Lijie|L|', 'Sun|Xiubin|X|', 'Jia|Hongying|H|', 'Xue|Fuzhong|F|']
D000328:Adult D044466:Asians D001794:Blood Pressure D015992:Body Mass Index D002681:China D005260:Female D006801:Humans D006943:Hyperglycemia D006973:Hypertension D007958:Leukocyte Count D008055:Lipids D008137:Longitudinal Studies D008297:Male D008875:Middle Aged D065626:Non-alcoholic Fatty Liver Disease D011446:Prospective Studies D012307:Risk Factors
White blood cell (WBC) Non-alcoholic Fatty Liver Disease (NAFLD) Chinese adults longitudinal cohort study