Men more prone to diabetes: Analysis

A retrospective data analysis done by SRL Diagnostics, the largest diagnostics chain in India, reveals that men are more prone to diabetes than women. The data analysis done on more than 6.3 million samples, collected to check blood sugars over past 3.5 years (2014 till mid-2017), unveiled that men accounted for 21% diabetes level blood sugar against 17.3% for women. Adults between the age of 46–60 and 61–85 (across genders) showed the highest prevalence of diabetes (26.71% and 27.01% respectively) across four zones in India. While, as per the city-wise analysis, Mumbai and Kolkata revealed the highest prevalence of diabetes (23.74% and 22.07%, respectively) as compared to other cities of India.

"If diabetes continues to rise at its present fast pace, India may regain the ignominy of being the diabetic capital of the world, from China. It is a terrible prospect because the most affected would be the working population, which directly impacts their families. A joint study by Harvard School of Public Health and the World Economic Forum indicates global GDP loss due to diabetes is projected to be $1.7 trillion between 2011 and 2030. As per International Diabetes Federation, there are more than 69 million people in India suffering from diabetes, with about 3.5 lakh deaths attributed to this disease annually." Dr B.R Das, Advisor and Mentor - R&D and Molecular Pathology commented.

"From tests to medicines, most of the cost for diabetes is directly borne by the individual. With rising healthcare costs and diabetes afflicting the near-retirement and post-retirement populace the most, the situation can worsen the disease's mortality rate. Extensive campaigns are required to boost awareness about the disease. It should be highlighted that diabetes can be controlled by adhering to a disciplined lifestyle and healthy eating habits," Dr Das added.

As per our analysis amongst the four zones, a western region of India showed higher percent (20.47%) of diabetes candidates. Our analysis unveiled a total of 19.22% of all individuals tested in our labs across India have diabetes. The common tests used for diagnosing diabetes are Fasting Blood Sugar (FBS), Post Prandial Blood Sugar (PPBS) and Glycosylated Haemoglobin (HbA1c). The American Diabetes Association (ADA) 2017 guidelines were followed to declare a sample positive for diabetes. Higher than internationally-accepted-threshold values on any two of the three tests (abnormal: ≥126 mg/dl for FBS; ≥200 for PPBS or ≥6.5 for HbA1c) were considered to determine if an individual was diabetic.