By Colin Kenny, Editor – Diabetes Distilled
The impact that the age at which type 2 diabetes is diagnosed has on life expectancy, excess risk of cardiovascular disease and death was analysed using the Swedish National Diabetes Registry. Investigators found that all risks were highest in patients diagnosed with diabetes at less than 40 years of age. They felt that this had implications for clinical decision-making and guideline-directed care in terms of the timing and intensity of risk factor interventions for people developing diabetes at a younger age.
Investigators used the Swedish National Diabetes Registry to compare 318,083 patients with type 2 diabetes registered between 1998 and 2012 with age-, sex- and county-matched controls randomly selected from the general population. They gathered data on total, cardiovascular and non-cardiovascular mortality in participants between 1998 and 2014, and coronary heart disease, acute myocardial infarction, stroke, heart failure and atrial fibrillation in participants between 1998 and 2013. They also examined participants to determine life expectancy by age at diagnosis.
A higher risk of all cardiovascular-related outcomes was found in the type 2 diabetes cohort, regardless of age at type 2 diabetes diagnosis. There were notable and consistent associations between age at diagnosis of diabetes and all of the outcomes analysed. Those diagnosed with type 2 diabetes when age 40 or younger had the highest excess relative risk for most outcomes. The most pronounced excess risks were in women with early-onset type 2 diabetes. The investigators suggested that treatment target recommendations might need to be more aggressive in people developing diabetes at younger ages.
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