The Prevalence and Risk Factors Associated with Diabetic Retinopathy Among Diabetic Patients in Baba Gurgur Diabetic Center

Abstract

<i>Background:</i> Diabetic retinopathy is one of the main causes of preventable blindness, so early detection and diagnosis play a great role to prevent uneventful blindness. <i>Aim of the study:</i> To determine the prevalence of diabetic retinopathy and specify risk factors among Gurgur diabetic patients. <i>Method:</i> A descriptive cross-sectional study was conducted among diabetic patients at Baba Gurgur Diabetic Center from November 2019 to May 2020. The study included 750 patients who, and the target was to determine the prevalence and the risk factors for Diabetic Retinopathy. <i>Result:</i> A 750 diabetic participants were involved in this study, with 55 years mean of age ranging from 23 to 80 years, (54.9%) were male, and (45.1%) were female. A (15.3%) patients were found with signs of Diabetic Retinopathy and (84.7%) with no signs of Diabetic Retinopathy, there was no significant relationship between male and female ratio in our study, DR increases significantly with age, below 30 years we didn’t record DR and gradually increase the percentage of DR with age, most of the patients were in the age group 50 and more. There was a significantly high level of mean HbAc1 (10.3) among the DR group in comparison to (8.5) in the non-DR group. Also, hypertension in our study group play a role in developing DR, a significantly high percentage of hypertension in the DR Group 60.9% patients in comparing to 42.5% patients in the non-DR Group was hypertensive, and regarding smoking also there was a strong relationship to the DR as we found 30.4% of the DR group were smokers in comparing to 22% in the non-DR group. Regarding the type of diabetes, we noticed significant relation with type I diabetic, 22.6% patients in group A have Type I diabetes in comparison to 16.2% patients in Group B, while in our study there was no relation of DR to the education level of the diabetic patients. <i>Conclusion: </i>Affair prevalence of Diabetic Retinopathy among Iraqi diabetic patients founded. High levels of HbA1c, hypertension, type I Diabetes, duration of Diabetes, and smoking are strongly correlated with diabetic retinopathy.