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. 2021 Jul;41(3):383-388.
doi: 10.1007/s13410-021-00930-y. Epub 2021 Feb 9.

Epidemiological characteristics and outcomes of COVID-19 in diabetic versus non-diabetic patients

Leila Moftakhar  1 , Parisa Moftakhar  2 , Elahe Piraee  3 , Haleh Ghaem  4 , Aliasghar Valipour  5 , Habibollah Azarbakhsh  3
Affiliations

Epidemiological characteristics and outcomes of COVID-19 in diabetic versus non-diabetic patients

Leila Moftakhar et al. Int J Diabetes Dev Ctries. 2021 Jul.

Abstract

Objectives and background: People with diabetes (PWD) are one of the high-risk groups for coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) infection, increasing the disease mortality. This study was aimed to compare the epidemiological characteristics and outcomes of COVID-19 in diabetic versus non-diabetic individuals.

Methods: In this retrospective observational study, the epidemiological characteristics of the two groups of diabetic (n=1365) and non-diabetic (n=15,026) subjects with definite diagnosis of COVID-19 in the southwestern region of Iran were compared. All clinical signs and comorbidities of the patients were evaluated. Chi-square test was used to examine the differences in qualitative variables between diabetic and non-diabetic groups.

Results: Of 16,391 enrolled subjects, 8.3% had diabetes, and 28.3% of COVID-19-related deaths occurred in diabetics. Also, the mortality rate among diabetics was reported as 14.3%. The average age of diabetic patients and non-diabetic patients was 59 and 37 years, respectively. The odds of fever, cough, shortness of breath, headache, and underlying diseases, such as hypertension, cardiovascular disease, chronic lung disease, immune deficiency, and hyperlipidemia, were significantly higher in diabetic patients than in non-diabetics.

Conclusion: Diabetes is associated with increased mortality rate in patients with COVID-19 and is considered as a major risk factor for COVID-19 infection, posing a major public health challenge for health policymakers in managing and controlling the disease. Therefore, development of prevention and treatment strategies aimed at reducing COVID-19 morbidity and mortality in diabetes patients is of significant importance.

Keywords: COVID-19; Diabetes; Mortality.

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Conflict of interest statement

Competing interestsThe authors declare that they have no competing interests.

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