Study Inclusion/exclusion criteria
| Inclusion criteria | Exclusion criteria |
| Human studies | Study assesses primary prevention of diabetes, obesity or metabolic syndrome |
| Study assesses primary prevention of CVD and risk reduction in patients without any history of CVD | Minimum age restriction less than 18 |
| Randomised controlled trials, both individual and cluster randomised and/or factorial 2×2 designs | Active intervention as a comparator, or only one arm or no comparator |
| Adult (18 years or older) South Asians originating from India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Bhutan and/or Nepal, regardless of their place of residence | Non-inert placebo |
| Lifestyle intervention must have one diet or physical exercise component or both combined | Study includes a population that is not primarily South Asian (less than 90%) |
| Lifestyle interventions that have a multimedia component (eg, text messaging) or a behavioural component if it affects at least one of diet or a physical activity component change | |
| Addresses at least one of the following: incidence of myocardial infarction (fatal and/or non-fatal), incidence of stroke (fatal and/or non-fatal), blood lipids (LDLc (mmol/L), HDLc (mmol/L), non-HDLc (mmol/L, if reported directly) and triglycerides (mmol/L)), blood pressure (SBP and DBP (mm Hg)), hypertension (dichotomous, reported as n (%) based on a threshold of 140/90 mm Hg), visceral adipose tissue volume (cm3, MRI or CT reported) and incidence of type 2 diabetes (self-reported, n (%)) |
CVD, cardiovascular disease; DBP, diastolic blood pressure; HDLc, high-density lipoprotein; LDLc, low-density lipoprotein; SBP, systolic blood pressure.