Limited joint mobility in insulin-dependent diabetes: relationship to retinopathy, peripheral nerve function and HLA status.

Eighty-eight (43 per cent) of 204 patients with insulin-dependent diabetes had limited joint mobility affecting mainly the small joints of the hands. The presence of limited joint mobility correlated with duration of diabetes and with the presence of retinopathy. Patients with longstanding diabetes were approximately 2.5 times more likely to have proliferative retinopathy if limited joint mobility was present than if it was absent, although the risk for non-proliferative or background retinopathy was not increased. In patients with longstanding diabetes and limited joint mobility nerve conduction velocity and vibration perception threshold were significantly reduced compared with patients having similar duration of diabetes but normal joints. The association between insulin-dependent diabetes and HLA-DR3 and HLA-DR4 was confirmed, but there was no difference, between patients with and without limited joint mobility, in the frequency of the various HLA types. Limitation of joint mobility appears to be another "chronic complication' of diabetes, developing in parallel with retinopathy and deteriorating peripheral nerve function, and possibly of similar aetiology.