The Profile of Clinically Diagnosed New Type 2 Diabetes among Asian Indians

Aim: To study the clinical and metabolic characteristics of newly diagnosed type 2 diabetes (T2DM) in urban clinics (CDD) and also to compare with the screen detected new diabetes cases (SDD) during an urban population survey. Methods: Newly diagnosed T2DM (aged 20-60 years, n=741), based on blood glucose and Glycosylated haemoglobin (HbA1c) of ≥6.5% (48 mmol/mol) were selected. Demography, anthropometry, blood pressure, glycaemic and lipids profiles were analysed. Relevant statistical tests were used for group comparisons. Results: Both groups had young age (45.0 ± 8.6 years) at diagnosis. Fasting blood glucose (p<0.05) and HbA1c (p<0.0001) were higher in CDD. Mean values of HbA1c were 9.1 ± 2.3% (76 ± 20 mmol/mol) in CDD and 8.3 ± 2.4% (67 ± 19 mmol/mol) in SDD (p<0.0001). Values of HbA1c were higher than ≥9.0% (75 mmol/mol) in 44.6% of CDD versus 26.4% of SDD (z=4.60, p<0.0001). SDD had higher body mass index (p<0.0001), abdominal obesity (p<0.005), hypertension (p<0.0001), cholesterol (p<0.005) and low density lipoprotein cholesterol (p<0.05) than CDD. Conclusion: Both groups had young age at diagnosis. CDD had more severe glycaemia than SDD, probably suggesting that the clinic visits were delayed and therefore had longer period of undiagnosed diabetes. In comparison to CDD, SDD had higher metabolic abnormalities although the HbA1c values were lower.