Diabetes Health in The News: Diabetes Plays Little Part in Risk of Cardiovascular Events

A study looking at the risk of cardiac death, myocardial infarction, and death for those who have and do not have diabetes and do not have coronary artery disease suggests that diabetes does not contribute to that risk. This study, done by a team from Denmark’s Aarhus University Hospital, looked at a number of patients listed on the Western Denmark Heart Registry. These individuals had undergone coronary angiography. Some did have coronary artery disease, while some also had diabetes. In total, 93,866 individuals were included in the cohort. Out of this, only 13.4% had a diagnosis of diabetes at the time of their coronary angiography.

During the follow-up study, the team compared the adjusted risk of cardiac death, myocardial infarction, and death. The results were the same regardless of diabetes. The study did note that patients who had diabetes but did not have coronary artery disease were more often treated with aspirin (65.7% as opposed to 52.7%) and statins (75.3% compared to 46.0%).

These findings were published in Diabetes Care on June 8, 2017.