Type 1 Diabetes Mellitus, Dyslipidemia and Vascular Complications

Abstract

The leading cause of death in patients with type 1 diabetes mellitus (T1DM) is cardiovascular disease (CVD). Traditional cardiovascular risk factors (CVRFs) are not sufficient to explain the high prevalence of cardiovascular events observed in people with T1DM. The objective is to describe the characteristics of patients with T1DM and to determine: the prevalence of obesity, smoking, and dyslipidemia; the degree of lipid control and the lipid-lowering treatment used; the prevalence of microvascular and macrovascular comorbidities; and the coexistence with other autoimmune diseases. To this end, we conducted a retrospective observational multicenter study (N=1252) of patients with type 1 diabetes mellitus using clinical database records from the Endocrinology departments of the hospitals in Santiago de Compostela, A Coruña, Ferrol, and Pontevedra. The following variables were collected: date of visit, age, sex, height, weight, smoking status, hypertension, lipid profile, lipid-lowering treatment, macro- and microvascular complications, and associated autoimmune diseases. Our results allow us to conclude that patients with T1DM exhibit prevalence rates of CVD and CVRFs similar to those reported in the scientific literature, confirming their high cardiovascular risk.