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. 2010 Dec;33(12):2592-7.
doi: 10.2337/dc10-0989. Epub 2010 Sep 10.

Changes in the incidence of lower extremity amputations in individuals with and without diabetes in England between 2004 and 2008

Eszter P Vamos  1 , Alex Bottle, Michael E Edmonds, Jonathan Valabhji, Azeem Majeed, Christopher Millett
Affiliations

Changes in the incidence of lower extremity amputations in individuals with and without diabetes in England between 2004 and 2008

Eszter P Vamos et al. Diabetes Care. 2010 Dec.

Abstract

Objective: To describe recent trends in the incidence of nontraumatic amputations among individuals with and without diabetes and estimate the relative risk of amputations among individuals with diabetes in England.

Research design and methods: We identified all patients aged >16 years who underwent any nontraumatic amputation in England between 2004 and 2008 using national hospital activity data from all National Health Service hospitals. Age- and sex-specific incidence rates were calculated using the total diabetes population in England every year. To test for time trend, we fitted Poisson regression models.

Results: The absolute number of diabetes-related amputations increased by 14.7%, and the incidence decreased by 9.1%, from 27.5 to 25.0 per 10,000 people with diabetes, during the study period (P > 0.2 for both). The incidence of minor and major amputations did not significantly change (15.7-14.9 and 11.8-10.2 per 10,000 people with diabetes; P = 0.66 and P = 0.29, respectively). Poisson regression analysis showed no statistically significant change in diabetes-related amputation incidence over time (0.98 decrease per year [95% CI 0.93-1.02]; P = 0.12). Nondiabetes-related amputation incidence decreased from 13.6 to 11.9 per 100,000 people without diabetes (0.97 decrease by year [0.93-1.00]; P = 0.059). The relative risk of an individual with diabetes undergoing a lower extremity amputation was 20.3 in 2004 and 21.2 in 2008, compared with that of individuals without diabetes.

Conclusions: This national study suggests that the overall population burden of amputations increased in people with diabetes at a time when the number and incidence of amputations decreased in the aging nondiabetic population.

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Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Changes in minor and major amputation incidence rates in (A) individuals with diabetes expressed per 10,000 people with diabetes and (B) individuals without diabetes expressed per 100,000 people without diabetes.
Figure 2
Figure 2
Changes in amputation incidence rates between 2004–2005 and 2008–2009 in England in (A) individuals with diabetes expressed per 10,000 people with diabetes and (B) individuals without diabetes expressed per 100,000 people without diabetes, by age and sex.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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