DOHA: A case-control study at Hamad Medical Corporation (HMC) to identify key risk factors for Type II diabetes in Qatar has found demographic and lifestyle factors largely responsible for the increasing incidence of the disease.
The study suggests that eliminating obesity and improving awareness about the disease may reduce cases by up to one-third for the population at large and up to half for Qataris.
Promoting physical activity may reduce diabetes mellitus cases by almost 10 percent for the population at large and by over 15 percent for citizens.
Qatar and other countries in the Middle East and North Africa has seen an alarming rise in the incidence in recent years.
Today, populations of several Gulf nations, including Qatar, Saudi Arabia and Kuwait, have rates of diabetes nearly three times the global average.
The study ‘Prevention of Type II diabetes mellitus in Qatar: Who is at risk?’ is published in the December 2014 issue of Qatar Medical Journal.
It was led by a team of researchers at Weill Cornell Medical College in its branches in New York and Qatar and HMC physicians.
The work was supported by Qatar Foundation, Weill Cornell Clinical and Translational Science Center, and Biostatistics, Epidemiology and Biomathematics Research Core of WCMC-Q.
Principal Investigator and senior author, Dr Alvin I Mushlin, Nanette Laitman Distinguished Professor of Public Health in the Department of Healthcare Policy and Research, Weill Cornell Medical College in New York City, said, “In addition to its direct effect on health and quality of life, diabetes is a cause of conditions such as diabetic retinopathy, kidney failure, cardiovascular disease and associated heart attacks, strokes, and earlier death.”
The study involved 459 patients with Type II diabetes mellitus from HMC outpatient adult diabetes clinics, and 342 control patients from outpatient clinics and inpatient departments at HMC, during 2006-2008.
Since over 80 percent of the population of Qatar consists of expatriates from the Arab world, South Asia and other regions, the researchers conducted a sub-analysis of only Qataris to see if they had a different risk factor profile.
“While there have been discussions about the role of genetic factors in the rising diabetes levels, our analysis suggests that socio-economic and lifestyle factors are more influential,” said study co-author Hiam Chemaitelly, epidemiologist, Infectious Disease Epidemiology Group, WCMC-Q. This should be seen as encouraging since many lifestyle factors can be modified.”
The Peninsula
