Family History of Type 2 Ups Risk of Prediabetes

By Diane Fennell People with a family history of Type 2 diabetes have an increased risk of developing prediabetes, according to a new analysis from the German Center for Diabetes Research. Approximately 79 million people in the United States currently have prediabetes. Prediabetes is a condition in which blood glucose levels are elevated, but are not high enough to be classified as Type 2 diabetes. An A1C level from 5.7–6.4% indicates prediabetes, as does a blood glucose level from 100–125 mg/dl on a fasting plasma glucose test or a blood glucose level of 140–199 mg/dl on an oral glucose tolerance test. (A diagnosis must be confirmed by another test on a subsequent day.) People with prediabetes are at high risk for developing Type 2. A family history of Type 2 diabetes is known to increase a person's risk for developing diabetes. To determine whether a family history of Type 2 is also associated with an increased risk for prediabetes, researchers looked at data from 8,106 people without diabetes collected in four study centers around Germany. Among the participants, 5,482 had normal blood glucose levels while 2,624 had prediabetes. Analyzing whether having at least one first-degree relative with Type 2 was associated with prediabetes, the researchers found that a family history of diabetes increased the risk of having prediabetes by 40%. When they adjusted for age, sex, and body-mass index (a measure of weight relative to height), the risk fell to 26%...
Source: Diabetes Self-Management - Category: Diabetes Authors: Source Type: blogs