A study has found more diabetes patients admitted for non-traditional side-effects.
Type 2 diabetes patients are being admitted to hospital with a rising number of non-traditional medical side-effects including depression and anaemia, a major study has suggested.
Just four traditional diabetes complications – cellulitis, heart failure, urinary tract infections, and skin abscesses – were ranked in the top 10 leading causes of hospital admissions in men and women with the condition in Australian hospitals.
The seven-year study said the most common reasons for people with type 2 diabetes being admitted to hospital more frequently than the wider population are changing.
Lesser-known side-effects of the condition, including infections such as pneumonia and sepsis, mental health disorders and gastrointestinal conditions, are on the rise.
Researchers tracked 456,000 type 2 diabetes patients aged 15 or older between 2010 and 2017, around half of the total in Australia.
They then linked this with hospital data and compared it to more than 19 million people in the wider Australian population, who were less likely overall to be admitted to hospital.
The findings are being presented at the European Association for the Study of Diabetes (EASD) annual meeting in Stockholm, Sweden, later this month.
The study categorised traditional complications as including vascular diseases, kidney failure, retinopathy and cataracts, neuropathy, obesity, and infections traditionally linked to diabetes such as urinary.
Emerging side-effects included liver disease, mental health disorders, various cancers such as gastrointestinal, and infections less commonly associated with diabetes, such as respiratory and sepsis.
Admissions for diabetes, such as glucose disturbances, were excluded, and the findings were modelled to estimate relative risk of hospital admission against the general public.
The leading cause of excess hospital admissions in men was cellulitis – a traditional effect – responsible for 364 excess annual hospital admissions per 100,000 men with type 2 diabetes.
But this was followed by the lesser-known complications of stress disorders (241 per 100,000) and iron deficiency anaemia (228 per 100,000) – with diabetes doubling the risk of admission for these conditions.
In females, the emerging complication of iron deficiency anaemia was the leading cause of excess annual admissions, at 558 per 100,000.
This was followed by the traditional complication of urinary tract infections, at 332 per 100,000, and cellulitis, at 267 per 100,000.
High rates of excess hospital admission were also noted for lesser-known complications including depression (256 per 100,000), gastrointestinal disorders (237 per 100,000) and asthma (192 per 100,000), and asthma.
In both sexes, there was a substantial excess risk of admissions for infections, mental health disorders, and gastrointestinal conditions amongst those with type 2 diabetes.
Lead study author Dr Dee Tomic, of the Baker Heart and Diabetes Institute in Melbourne, Australia, said: “The emergence of non-traditional diabetes complications reflects improvements in diabetes management and people with diabetes living longer, making them susceptible to a broader range of complications.
“Increasing hospitalisations for mental health disorders as well as infections like sepsis and pneumonia will place extra burden on healthcare systems and may need to be reflected in changes to diabetes management to better prevent and treat these conditions.”
In England, classic side-effects accounted for more than half of hospital admissions in people with diabetes in 2003, but for less than a third in 2018.
Dr Faye Riley, from Diabetes UK, said: “It’s important to remember that complications of diabetes are not inevitable. With the right support to help manage the condition, it is possible to live well and avoid future health problems.”
The study was funded by Diabetes Australia and showed observational trends, rather than cause and effect relationships, focused solely on a high-income country.
Published: by Radio NewsHub