Abstract
It has been confirmed that diabetic microangiopathies are usually not progressive in Caucasian patients with maturity-onset type diabetes of the young (MODY). MODY is classified as noninsulin-dependent diabetes mellitus (NIDDM) characterized by a dominant heredity. The onset of the disease is before the age of 25 years.
However microangiopathies in Japanese patiens with MODY seem to be not so rare and in some the progression of the microangiopathies is rapid. A case of MODY with proliferative retinopathy and neuropathy was admitted our hospital in 1984.
At admission she was 30 years old. Diabetes was found when she was 11 years old and she was treated with diet alone for 9 years. When she was 20 years old, proliferative retinopathy appeared and insulin therapy was started at that time. Albuminuria occurred at the age of 26 years, and elevation of the serum creatinine level at the age of 28 years.
Her mother, 56 years old, also suffers from diabetic proliferative retinopathy and receives hemodialysis for diabetic nephropathy. The mother's diabetes was found 40 years ago and her father was also diabetic from the age of 30 years.
A younger sister, now 28 years old, had diabetes with retinopathy when she was 17 years old. The retinopathy is now proliferative and intermittent albuminuria is present.
In conclusion, the female patient reported in this paper became diabetic before 25 years of age and have a dominant heredity of NIDDM with rapid onset and progression of microangiopathies.
