Comparison of complete blood count parameters in different severity of proteinuria among patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus.

Background: Proteinuria is a key indicator of kidney damage in diabetic nephropathy, and its severity correlates with the progression of the disease. In diabetic patients, it is crucial to identify reliable predictors for proteinuria and its severity for early detection and management of kidney damage.

Materials and methods: This cross-sectional study was conducted from November 16, 2022, to May 20, 2023, on patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) who were outpatients at clinics of Shahid Modarres Hospital, Tehran, Iran. Participants were categorized based on their level of proteinuria during 24-h as follows: group A1 (normal to mildly increased proteinuria), Group A2 (moderately increased proteinuria), and Group A3 (severely increased proteinuria). Then, complete blood cell count and other laboratory parameters, were compared between study groups.

Results: In this cross-sectional study, 128 participants, including 53 (41.4%) men and 75 (58.6%) women with T2DM, were enrolled. The mean age of participants was 56.40 ± 13.31 years. Although there were no significant differences between cell count and parameters of three groups, a statistically significant difference was seen in neutrophil-to-lymphocyte ratio (NLR) (1.93 ± 0.76, 2.34 ± 0.93, and 2.73 ± 1.07 in A1, A2, and A3 groups, respectively; P = 0.003). Further analysis showed that NLR was significantly higher in Group A3 compared to A1 (2.73 ± 1.07 vs. 1.93 ± 0.76, respectively; P = 0.006), but there was no significant difference between Groups A3 and A2 (2.73 ± 1.07 vs. 2.34 ± 0.93, respectively; P = 0.482) and between Groups A2 and A1 (2.34 ± 0.93 vs. 1.93 ± 0.76, respectively; P = 0.257).

Conclusion: Overall, this study suggests that some routine laboratory parameters may be associated with proteinuria and its severity in patients with T2DM. NLR, in particular, showed this association in our study, promising future studies evaluating this association and whether it can help as a predictor or not.