Abstract
In 1, 739 diabetic patients who died between 1968-1970 in Japan, the causes of death were studied regarding their relationship to the presumptive age of the onset of diabetes and the age of death. The data of these patients were collected from many doctors in 384 hospitals.
Among the diabetics in which the disease had its onset before 50 years old, the most frequent cause of death was diabetic nephropathy. On the other hand, in those in which the onset was at age 50 or over, cerebrovascular disease was the most frequent cause of death. Particularly, in 66 dead cases who aquired the disease when they were under 25 years of age, the main causes of death were diabetic nephropathy (39 %), diabetic coma (29 %) and infectious diseases of various organs (10 %), and none of them died from cerebrovascular disease, ischemic heart disease, malignant neoplasms and cirrhosis of the liver.
Regarding the relationship between the causes of death and the age of death, in the diabetics who died before 30 years of age the most frequent cause of death was diabetic coma. In the patients who died at from age 30 to 59 and in those died at age 60 or over, the most frequent cause of death was diabetic nephropathy and cerebrovascular disease, respectively. Among 66 dead cases in which the onset was under 25 years old, 64 (97 %) cases died before 40 years old.
A ratio of the duration of diabetes to the expectation of life in the general population of a matched age of the onset of diabetes was calculated for those who died from diabetic coma and diabetic nephropathy. In the cases which died from diabetic coma (159 cases) the mean ratio showed a lower value of 23.3+1.6 %(Mean+SEM) than that of 35.0±1.4%(Mean± SEM) in those which died from diabetic nephropathy (294 cases). In those which died from diabetic nephropathy, the mean ratio in the female (28.9±1.6%, N=136) was significantly lower than that in the male (40.3±2.1%, N=158), (p<0.001)
