By Colin Kenny, GP, Dromore
The researchers noted that hypoglycaemia admissions are rising worldwide and wanted to gather information about trends in hospital admission for hypoglycaemia and subsequent outcomes in England. They collected data for all hospital admissions listing hypoglycaemia as the primary reason of admission. They also stratified the data for age, sex, ethnic group, social deprivation and a comorbidity score.
They found that 79,172 people had 101,475 admissions for hypoglycaemia between 2005 and 2014, of which 72,568 (72%) occurred in people aged 60 years or older. The number of admissions increased steadily for the first 5 years and then seemed to plateau. Although the investigators found a real increase in admissions, they did observe that diabetes prevalence was also increasing substantially during this time. They recommend that individual and national initiatives should be implemented to reduce the burden of hospital admissions for hypoglycaemia.
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