Think Beyond Type 1 Diabetes in Children Presenting with High Blood Sugar

Abstract

Children presenting with high blood sugar in our clinics are often diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes considering the age of the patient. This case will highlight the need for proper diagnosis in the children to provide them with suitable treatment as per their diagnosis. We report a case of an 8-year-old boy who presented with complaints of weight loss of approximately 2 kg in a span of two months. His height was 134.9 cm and weight was 47 kg with a BMI of 26. His family history of diabetes was positive. To our surprise the patient did not have a simple case of type 1 diabetes as expected, the patient responded well to the diet and lifestyle modification in the beginning, and after a few months, he was started on anti-diabetic treatment as his blood sugar showed a spike. The final diagnosis for this patient was considered as latent autoimmune diabetes of young/ children as the patient’s GAD 65 was highly positive and C-peptide levels were normal. The correct diagnosis of diabetes type in children can help them to prevent the unnecessary psychological burden of multiple injection therapy from a young age and provide them with good quality of life and preserve their beta cells with minimal insulin therapy. Keywords: Latent Autoimmune Diabetes; Auto-antibodies; Diabetes Mellitus; C-peptide