medwireNews: The strength of the association between diabetes and the risk for cardiovascular events has lessened over recent years, report researchers.
The team found that in 1994 residents of Ontario with diabetes had a 2.06-fold increased risk for cardiovascular events over the following 5 years relative to those with neither diabetes nor prevalent cardiovascular disease (CVD), at 28.4 versus 12.7 events per 1000 person–years.
But in 2019 this had reduced to a 1.58-fold risk increase, at 14.0 versus 8.0 per 1000 person–years.
By contrast, prevalent CVD was associated with a 2.16-fold increased risk for cardiovascular events in 1994, at 36.1 versus 12.7 events per 1000 person–years, and a similar 2.06-fold risk increase in 2019, at 23.9 events per 1000 person–years.
In both years, the combination of diabetes and prevalent CVD was associated with the highest risk overall, report Calvin Ke (University of Toronto, Ontario, Canada) and co-researchers.
Their study, detailed in a research letter published in JAMA, used population-based data from Ontario. In 1994, the rates of diabetes and CVD were 3.1% and 2.5%, respectively, and in 2019, they were 9.0% and 3.7%.
“These results suggest that diabetes is still an important cardiovascular risk factor but no longer equivalent to CVD—a change that likely reflects the use of modern, multifactorial approaches to diabetes,” the team concludes.
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JAMA 2022; doi:10.1001/jama.2022.14914