Abstract
We examined the relationship between diabetes mellitus (DM) and ischemic heart disease (IHD) deaths in a case-control study. There were 1, 857 deaths aged 40 to 74 years old in Oita City with a population of 419, 000, in the period 1992-93. A total of 354 deaths were heart disease and IHD related deaths as recorded on death certificates. A total of 100 IHD deaths were reevaluated through the MONICA criteria from this data. Cases were 88 IHD deaths, which were investigated for past histories of DM, hypertension (HT) and hyperlipidemia (HL). Controls were randomly selected, matched by age (within 2 years) and sex, from a population of 1, 003 subjects who participated in annual health check -ups (this amounted to 60% of all residents over 40 years old) in C Village near Oita City, where cases were studied for prevalence of DM. The adjusted odds ratio of DM for IHD deaths was 5.1 (95% confidence interval : 2.6-9.9) analyzed by a conditional logistic regression model with 3 variables of DM, HT and HL. This odds ratio was higher than that of HT and HL. About 70% of these cases were deaths within 24 hours from the onset of symptoms. This data suggests that DM represents a greatly significant risk factor for severe heart attacks which lead to IHD deaths.
