Risk Trajectories of Type 2 Diabetes-Related Microvascular Complications Across Racial/Ethnic Groups Among Older Adults.

INTRODUCTION

Type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) microvascular complications are a major public health issue that disproportionately affects racial/ethnic minorities in the US. We aimed to address the limited understanding of racial/ethnic disparities in the longitudinal natural history of microvascular complications over eight years among older adults with T2DM in the US and Canada.

METHODS

From 10,251 participants in the Action to Control Cardiovascular Risk in Diabetes (ACCORD) (2003-2009) trial, we derived 6323 participants. We examined racial/ethnic disparities of composite microvascular complications, nephropathy, neuropathy, and retinopathy outcomes among adults of Black (n = 1099), White (n = 4071), and Other races (n = 1156), over 8 years. We used linear mixed-effects model with random intercept to account for intra-person correlation.

RESULTS

Our linear mixed-effects models displayed that the odds of composite microvascular complications for other race, which primarily consisted of Hispanic adults declined over a period of time [OR: 0.95 (0.93-0.99)]. The odds increased over time for Black [1.06 (1.03-1.09)] and White [1.11 (1.09-1.13)] adults (P < 0.001).

CONCLUSION

Other race adults had a declining risk of microvascular complications over time. This decline was not observed among Black and White adults.