Impact of Diabetes on Complications, Long Term Mortality and Recurrence in 608,890 Hospitalised Patients with Stroke.

BACKGROUND

Patients with diabetes mellitus (DM) have been found to be at an increased risk of suffering a stroke. However, research on the impact of DM on stroke outcomes is limited.

OBJECTIVES

We aimed to examine the influence of DM on outcomes in ischaemic (IS) and haemorrhagic stroke (HS) patients.

METHODS

We included 608,890 consecutive stroke patients from the Thailand national insurance registry. In-hospital mortality, sepsis, pneumonia, acute kidney injury (AKI), urinary tract infection (UTI) and cardiovascular events were evaluated using logistic regressions. Long-term analysis was performed on first-stroke patients with a determined pathology (n = 398,663) using Royston-Parmar models. Median follow-ups were 4.21 and 4.78 years for IS and HS, respectively. All analyses were stratified by stroke sub-type.

RESULTS

Mean age (SD) was 64.3 (13.7) years, 44.9% were female with 61% IS, 28% HS and 11% undetermined strokes. DM was associated with in-hospital death, pneumonia, sepsis, AKI and cardiovascular events (odds ratios ranging from 1.13-1.78, p < 0.01) in both stroke types. In IS, DM was associated with long-term mortality and recurrence throughout the follow-up: HR (99% CI) at t = 4108 days: 1.54 (1.27, 1.86) and HR (99% CI) = 1.27(1.23,1.32), respectively. In HS, HR (t = 4108 days) for long-term mortality was 2.10 (1.87, 2.37), significant after day 14 post-discharge. HR (t = 455) for long-term recurrence of HS was 1.29 (1.09, 1.53), significant after day 116 post-discharge.

CONCLUSIONS

Regardless of stroke type, DM was associated with in-hospital death and complications, long-term mortality and stroke recurrence.