Risk of Type 2 Diabetes among Osteoarthritis Patients in a Prospective Longitudinal Study

Objectives. Our aim was to determine the risk of diabetes among osteoarthritis (OA) cases in a prospective longitudinal study. Methods. Administrative health records of 577,601 randomly selected individuals from British Columbia, Canada, from 1991 to 2009, were analyzed. OA and diabetes cases were identified by checking physician's visits and hospital records. From 1991 to 1996 we documented 19,143 existing OA cases and selected one non-OA individual matched by age, sex, and year of administrative records. Poisson regression and Cox proportional hazards models were fitted to estimate the effects after adjusting for available sociodemographic and medical factors. Results. At baseline, the mean age of OA cases was 61 years and 60.5% were women. Over 12 years of mean follow-up, the incidence rate (95% CI) of diabetes was 11.2 (10.90–11.50) per 1000 person years. Adjusted RRs (95% CI) for diabetes were 1.27 (1.15–1.41), 1.21 (1.08–1.35), 1.16 (1.04–1.28), and 0.99 (0.86–1.14) for younger women (age 20–64 years), older women (age ≥ 65 years), younger men, and older men, respectively. Conclusion. Younger adults and older women with OA have increased risks of developing diabetes compared to their age-sex matched non-OA counterparts. Further studies are needed to confirm these results and to elucidate the potential mechanisms.