That Health Rules

Just a note for all of the readers with family members who are diabetics.  This is just to make you aware that control of sugar is of paramount importance even at the time of hospitalization especially due to heart attack.

This new study published in Archives of Internal Medicine, Feb 2009 shows that the relationship between fasting blood sugar on admission and its ability to predict outcome of death within 6 months of the acute attack.

__________________________________________________________________________________________

Background  Elevated blood glucose level at admission is associated with worse outcome after a myocardial infarction. The impact of elevated glucose level, particularly fasting glucose, is less certain in non–ST-segment elevation acute coronary syndromes. We studied the relationship between elevated fasting blood glucose levels and outcome across the spectrum of ST-segment elevation and non–ST-segment elevation acute coronary syndromes in a large multicenter population broadly representative of clinical practice.

Methods  Fasting glucose levels were available for 13 526 patients in the Global Registry of Acute Coronary Events. A multivariate logistic regression analysis was used for assessing the association between admission or fasting glucose level and in-hospital or 6-month outcome, adjusted for the variables from the registry risk scores.

Results 

• Higher fasting glucose levels were associated with a graded increase in the risk of in-hospital death (odds ratios [95% confidence intervals] vs <100 mg/dL: 1.51 [1.12-2.04] for 100-125 mg/dL, 2.20 [1.64-2.60] for 126-199 mg/dL, 5.11 [3.52-7.43] for 200-299 mg/dL, and 8.00 [4.76-13.5] for 300 mg/dL).
• When taken as a continuous variable, higher fasting glucose level was related to a higher probability of in-hospital death, without detectable threshold and irrespective of whether patients had a history of diabetes mellitus.
• Higher fasting glucose levels were found to be associated with a higher risk of postdischarge death up to 6 months.
• The risk of postdischarge death at 6 months was significantly higher with fasting glucose levels between 126 and 199 mg/dL (1.71 [1.25-2.34]) and 300 mg/dL or greater (2.93 [1.33-6.43]), but not within the 200- to 299-mg/dL range (1.08 [0.60-1.95]).

Conclusions  Short-term and 6-month mortality was increased significantly with higher fasting glucose levels in patients across the spectrum of acute coronary syndromes, thus extending this relation to patients with non–ST-segment elevation myocardial infarction. The relation between fasting glucose level and risk of adverse short-term outcomes is graded across different glucose levels with no detectable threshold for diabetic or nondiabetic patients.

^{_______________________________________________________________________________________________________}

Better still…. across the spectrum of diabetes management that good control should always be practiced.  

No ifs or buts…its the RULE!

Reduction in short term complications, the sense of well being…plus reduction of long term complications like stroke and heart attack…are more than enough for any diabetic in the family to make sure that good control should always be practiced.  

Ths study tells us that up to the time of the acute event, high sugar continues to present itself as a menace.  And that high sugar should not be relegated as a mere stress effect but for me should be aggressively treateed as metabolic effects can have lasting impact on ones health and are irreversible!

Be aggressive as high sugar may not manifest any symptoms until its late!

This entry was posted on February 26, 2009 at 1:46 pm and is filed under Medical News Bits, The Diabetes Facts, Tips To Protect Your Heart, What's New in Diabetes.