European Journal of Biomedical and Pharmaceutical Sciences

ASSESSMENT OF PREVALENCE OF TYPE-2 DIABETES MELLITUS AMONG UNDERGRADUATE STUDENTS IN WEST BENGAL, INDIA

Purushottam Pramanik*

ABSTRACT

Diabetes mellitus is a public health problem with increasing prevalence worldwide. Type2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) is now alarmingly high among young and causes rapid progression of chronic vascular, myocardial, neuronal, nephrogenic and retinal complication. This suggests the need for screening programs to detect diabetes at an early stage. Thus objective of this study was to assess the prevalence of T2DM among under graduate students in West Bengal, India using sensitive and cost effective tools. A cross sectional study was done among 1869 (male-732, female 1137) undergraduate students in West Bengal, India using Indian Diabetic Risk Score (IDRS) and American Diabetic Association proposed Risk Score (ADARS). A predesigned questionnaire was developed and was used to data collection. IDRS shows that 5.3% of male and 11.0% female students were in high risk group, 65.6% male and 67.0% female students were under medium risk group. According to ADARS prevalence of type2 diabetes risk for male and female was 9.7% and 13.7% respectively. According to obesity classification for Asians more than 30% (33.9% for male and29.2% for female) students were either overweight or obese. 28.6% students were centrally obese. More than 20% students were hypertensive.76.1% students had no exercise and sedentary work. This study reveals that young college students are highly vulnerable to T2DM in future. Age, family history of diabetes, BMI and/or central obesity, hypertension and physical inactivity have strong association with diabetic risk scores. Except age and family history of diabetes all others risk factors are modifiable with life style modification and dietary changes. It is recommended that all undergraduate students should be tested to determine the risk of developing T2DM so that proper intervention can be carried out to reduce the burden of diabetes in future.

Keywords: Type2 diabetes, IDRS, ADARS, Waist circumference, hypertension, family history.