EPIDEMIOLOGY OF KNOWN DIABETES IN LOMBARDY, NORTH ITALY - CLINICAL CHARACTERISTICS AND METHODOLOGICAL ASPECTS

Diabetes epidemiology can benefit in Italy from the large network of o utpatient diabetic clinics and patients' facilities. A large investiga tion was carried out in 1988, in a certain area of northern Italy, to estimate the prevalence of known diabetes. Using four information sour ces, 4547 distinct patients were identified. Through the capture-recap ture method we assessed completeness and estimated a prevalence of 3.3 %. Prevalence of type 1 diabetes was 0.8 per 1000. Italian age-standar dised overall prevalence and developed-world standardised rates were 2 .8% and 2.6%, respectively. A representative sample of 2358 patients w as characterised through a standard questionnaire. Women were diagnose d about 6 years later than men (58.8+/-0.4 us 52.9+/-0.4, P<0.0001), w hile the duration of the disease was very similar in both sexes (9.9+/ -0.2 vs 9.5+/-0.2). As regards diabetes therapy, 17.2% of the patients were on diet alone, 62.1% on oral agents and 20.6% on insulin. Among the insulin-treated subjects more than half were on adjuvant therapy w ith tablets, and only 6.2% were treated with 3 injections/day. Less th an half of all the known diabetic subjects had had an ophthalmoscopic examination in the previous 2 years.