New study shows type 1 diabetes
on the rise in Colorado’s youth
In a new study appearing in the March 2007 issue of Diabetes Care, researchers at the University of Colorado Denver assessed the long-term trends of the occurrence of type 1 diabetes among non-Hispanic white and Hispanic youth in Colorado. From 1978 to 2004, the incidence of type 1 diabetes in Colorado youth ages 0 to 17 increased by 2.7 percent annually in the non-Hispanic white population and by 1.6 percent per year in Hispanic youth. The trends are similar in males and females with the largest increase of 3.5 percent per year observed in children ages 0 to four.
This is the first study in the United States to show an increase in type 1 diabetes among non-Hispanic white youth that matches the pattern and magnitude of the trends observed in similar studies throughout Europe.
The UCD study included all youth in Colorado with a new onset of type 1 diabetes diagnosed by a physician. The youths were identified through two population-based diabetes registries in Colorado – the Colorado IDDM Registry and the Colorado SEARCH for Diabetes in Youth Registry – both created by UCD researchers through grants from the National Institutes of Health and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
The Colorado IDDM Registry, created in 1978 by Richard Hamman, MD, DrPH, professor and chair of UCD’s School of Medicine’s Department of Preventive Medicine and Biometrics, is a statewide diabetes registry that tracked all youth ages 0 to 17 of non-Hispanic white and Hispanic origin diagnosed with type 1 diabetes from 1978 to 1988. The current registry in Colorado is part of a six-state, multi-ethnic observational study, SEARCH for Diabetes in Youth, that tracks all new cases of diabetes in youth ages 0 to 19. SEARCH began tracking youth with new onset diabetes on Jan. 1, 2002, in Colorado, Washington, Hawaii, South Carolina, Ohio and California.
“ What is particularly interesting about this study is that the largest increase in the incidence of type 1 diabetes in Colorado’s youth occurred in children ages 0 to 4,” said Dana Dabelea, MD, PhD, lead investigator for Colorado’s SEARCH for Diabetes in Youth study and director of the Epidemiology PhD Program in the Preventive Medicine and Biometrics Department in UCD’s School of Medicine. “We may be seeing an onset of type 1 diabetes in children at younger ages, which gives this age group such a large jump in occurrence comparatively.”
“ These findings are particularly noteworthy given the current limited data on the incidence of diabetes of any type among youth nationwide,” said Dabelea. “We are facing important changes in the environment in which these youth are growing up that in turn may be changing the face of diabetes in this country. These findings reiterate how important it is that all states have diabetes surveillance or tracking systems in place.”
This study was conducted by researchers in the Department of Preventive Medicine and Biometrics at UCD’s School of Medicine in collaboration with investigators at the Barbara Davis Center for Childhood Diabetes, pediatric endocrinologists, other diabetes providers, and hospitals throughout the state of Colorado. The lead author, Kendra Vehik, a doctoral student in epidemiology at the school, worked closely with Dr. Dabelea on this study.
