Diabetes Health in the News Podcast: Gestational Diabetes Hypertension Increases Diabetes Risk

A recent study completed at the Pennington Biomedical Research Center in Baton Rouge, LA aimed to determine how a combination of hypertension and gestational diabetes affected later diabetes risk. This was completed by examining approximately 1,260 Chinese women with a history of gestational diabetes.

The results from this study showed that women who had both hypertension and gestational diabetes – and those who didn’t use antihypertensive medications – during pregnancy were 3.94 times more likely to develop type 2 diabetes later in life compared to women with gestational diabetes with healthy blood pressure levels. Health care providers should pay particular attention to diabetes prevention when high blood pressure levels are indicated in women who are at-risk during pregnancy.

These findings were published in the Journal of Diabetes and Its Complications on May 4, 2016.