The good and the bad of diabetes mellitus in the critically ill

Diabetes mellitus is increasingly prevalent and associated with significant end organ damage that one may presume to impact upon critical illness. However, Siegelaar and colleagues present data that suggest, excepting those patients admitted to a cardiac intensive care unit, the presence of diabetes mellitus is not associated with increased mortality in critically ill patients. It is not possible to unpick how unmeasured parameters such as glycaemic control, the nature of whether type I or type II, or concomitant drug therapy confound the results. Nevertheless, the results are consistent with many risk-adjustment models used in the critically ill, and clinical practice that tolerates mild hyperglycaemia. Is it even possible that diabetes mellitus is protective?