A Study of Fasting and Postprandial Lipid Profile among Patients with and without Diabetes Mellitus in a Tertiary Care Hospital - Kottayam, Kerala

BACKGROUND Type 2 diabetes mellitus (DM) is characterized by insulin resistance which is associated with glucose intolerance, hypertension, dyslipidaemia, a procoagulant state, and an increase in the microvascular and the macrovascular disease. The high cardiovascular mortality which is associated with type 2 DM is due to a prolonged, exaggerated, postprandial state. The abnormal lipid profile in the postprandial state is more significant than the abnormal lipid profile in the fasting state in causing atherosclerotic complications in type 2 diabetes. Very few studies are available on the estimation of the postprandial lipid profile in type 2 diabetes patients. The purpose of this study was to compare fasting and postprandial lipid levels among patients with and without diabetes mellitus and find out the correlation between duration of detection of diabetes mellitus and postprandial lipid levels among patients with diabetes mellitus. METHODS This is a cross sectional analytical study of a study population of 200 subjects including in patients and out patients of wards and diabetic clinic of Government Medical College, Kottayam from April 2017 to March 2018. Data was coded and entered in Microsoft Excel and IBM Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS version 22) for statistical analysis. RESULTS Diabetic patients had impaired fasting and postprandial lipid profiles. Impairment in postprandial lipid profile when compared to non-diabetics was statistically significant. Duration of detection of diabetes and postprandial lipid levels showed weak positive correlation. CONCLUSIONS The postprandial lipid profile in diabetes mellitus patients is significantly deranged compared to fasting state and is an important factor in assessing their cardiovascular risk. Hence, there is a need to stress on postprandial lipid profile estimation in diabetic patients.