Diabetes - A silent killer
Diabetes is a serious disease that affects the body's ability to produce or respond properly to insulin, a hormone that allows blood glucose (sugar) to enter the cells of the body and be used for energy. Nearly 21 million children and adults in the U.S. have diabetes. It is the fifth deadliest disease in the U.S. and it has no cure.
Incidence of diabetes, United States, 2005
1.5 million new cases of diabetes were diagnosed in people aged 20 years or older in 2005.
Deaths among people with diabetes, United States, 2002
- Diabetes was the sixth leading cause of death listed on U.S. death certificatesin 2002. This ranking is based on the 73,249 death certificates in which diabetes was listed as the underlying cause of death. According to death certificate reports, diabetes contributed to a total of 224,092 deaths.
- Diabetes is likely to be underreported as a cause of death. Studies have found that only about 35% to 40% of decedents with diabetes had it listed anywhere on the death certificate and only about 10% to 15% had it listed as the underlying cause of death.
- Overall, the risk for death among people with diabetes is about twice that of people without diabetes of similar age.
Pre-Diabetes: Impaired glucose tolerance and impaired fasting glucose
- Pre-diabetes is a condition that raises the risk of developing type 2 diabetes, heart disease, and stroke. People with pre-diabetes have blood glucose levels higher than normal but not high enough to be classified as diabetes.
- People with pre-diabetes have impaired fasting glucose (IFG) or impaired glucose tolerance (IGT). Some people have both IFG and IGT.
- IFG is a condition in which the fasting blood sugar level is 100 to 125 milligrams per decileter (mg/dL) after an overnight fast. The level is higher than normal, but not high enough to be classified as diabetes.
- IGT is a condition in which the blood sugar level is 140 to 199 mg/dL after a 2 hour oral glucose tolerance test. This level is higher than normal, but not high enough to be classified as diabetes.
- In a cross-section sample of U.S. adults aged 40-74 years tested from 1988 to 1994, 33.8% had IFG, 15.4% had IGT, and 40.1% had pre-diabetes (IGT or IFG or both). Applying these percentages to the entire popluation in 2000, an estimated 35 million of adults aged 40-74 had IFG, 16 million had IGT, and 41 million had pre-diabetes (there is overlap between the IFG and IGT groups).
