Rising incidence of type 1 diabetes in Belgrade children aged 0-14 years in the period from 1982 to 2005.

BACKGROUND

Type 1 diabetes (T1DM) is an autoimmune disease in which both genetic and environmental factors play a role in the etiology.

AIM

The aim of this study was to analyze the incidence of T1DM.

METHODS

A retrospective technique was used to register all newly diagnosed cases of T1DM in Belgrade (Serbia) children at the age of 0- 14 yr between 1982 and 2005. The incidence was adjusted directly by age using the Segi's world population as the standard. A total of 702 cases was identified from the two sources: patients' records from two pediatric hospitals in Belgrade referent for the disease, and from the population based register.

RESULTS

The average annual age adjusted incidence rate of T1DM for Belgrade was 10.4/100,000 [95% confidence interval (95% CI)=3.8-15.4]. It was slightly higher in boys than in girls. The age-specific annual incidence rates (per 100,000) for the age groups 0-4, 5-9, and 10-14 were 5.5 (95% CI=4.5-6.7), 11.9 (95% CI=10.5-13.5), and 15.4 (95% CI=13.8-17.1), respectively. Over the 24 yr incidence rates significantly increased by 8.5% for boys and 3.0% for girls. The highest increase of incidence rate was in the 5-9 age group.

DISCUSSION

The results obtained are in line with data from other studies showing that the incidence of T1DM has been increasing in almost all populations worldwide.