All-Cause Mortality Risk 40% Higher in Women With Type 1 Diabetes

According to a recent study, women who have type 1 diabetes had a 40% higher risk of all-cause mortality and double the risk of experiencing adverse, nonfatal vascular events, compared to men with type 1 diabetes.

“Studies have suggested sex differences in the mortality rate associated with type 1 diabetes. We did a meta-analysis to provide reliable estimates of any sex differences in the effect of type 1 diabetes on risk of all-cause mortality and cause-specific outcomes,” said the authors of the study.
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For the meta-analysis, researchers selected studies listed on PubMed that were published from January 1, 1966 to November 26, 2014. The selected studies featured hazard ratios pertaining to type 1 diabetes and sex-specific estimates of the standardized mortality ratio (SMR).

Researchers then analyzed data from 26 studies that included 214,114 participants and 15,273 events to pool a women-to-men ratio of the standardized mortality ratio (SMR) for all-cause mortality, mortality from cardiovascular disease, cancer, renal disease, incident coronary heart disease and stroke associated with type 1 diabetes, and the combined outcome of accident and suicide.

The study showed that the SMR for all-cause mortality was 1.37 for the pooled women-to-men ratio.

Further, the pooled SMR for fatal renal disease was 1.44, the SMR for fatal cardiovascular disease was 1.86, and the incidence of stroke was 1.37.

According to researchers, the sex difference was more extreme for incident coronary heart disease, with an SMR of 2.54.

The investigators noted that there was no evidence suggesting a sex difference for any mortality linked to type 1 diabetes from cancer, accident, or suicide.

The complete study is published in the February issue of The Lancet Diabetes and Endocrinology.

-Michelle Canales

Reference:

Huxley RR, Peters SAE, Mishra GD, et al. Risk of all-cause mortality and vascular events in women versus men with type 1 diabetes: a systematic review and meta-analysis. Ebio Med. 2015 February [epub ahead of print] doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/S2213-8587(14)70248-7.