High frequency of autonomic as well as peripheral neuropathy in patients with malnutrition-related diabetes mellitus.

We assessed peripheral and autonomic nerve function in 27 diabetics. Ten had malnutrition-related diabetes mellitus (MRDM), eight insulin-dependent diabetes mellitus (IDDM), and nine non-insulin-dependent diabetes mellitus (NIDDM). The frequency of peripheral neuropathy was 70, 78 and 13% in MRDM, NIDDM and IDDM respectively. Furthermore, the frequency of abnormality in cardiac beat-to-beat variation was 50 and 38% in MRDM and IDDM respectively, whereas our NIDDM patients did not show this abnormality. The patients with MRDM thus revealed a high frequency of not only peripheral but also autonomic neuropathy. Autonomic dysfunction appears to be a new characteristic of MRDM, not mentioned by the WHO study group.