Patients With Neurogenic Lower Urinary Tract Dysfunction Following Spinal Cord Injury Are at Increased Risk of Developing Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus: A Population-Based Cohort Study

To investigate whether patients with neurogenic lower urinary tract dysfunction (NLUTD) following spinal cord injury (SCI) are at increased risk of developing type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM). The retrospective cohort study used a subset of the Taiwan National Health Insurance Research Database (NHIRD) comprising information on 2 million beneficiaries randomly sampled from the general population. A total of 3515 patients with newly diagnosed SCI were identified during the period of 2001 to 2008. Among them, 170 developed NLUTD following SCI. The control group was consisted of 656 patients without NLUTD over the study period randomly selected by matching NLUTD cases on the date of NLUTD incidence, age, sex, and duration since diagnosis of SCI. The study groups were then followed to the end of 2009. T2DM was the end-point. The incidence rate ratios of T2DM were higher in the NLUTD group than in the control group (4.94 vs. 2.61 per 10,000 person-years), representing an adjusted hazard ratio (AHR) of 1.70 (95% confidence interval [CI] 1.11–2.61). Age-specific AHR was significantly elevated only in patients aged > = 60 years (AHR = 2.52 (95% CI 1.35–4.70)). This study showed that the NLUTD following SCI may significantly increase the risk of developing T2DM.