Frequency of Peripheral Neuropathy in Newly Diagnosed Type 2 Diabetes Presenting in a Tertiary Care Hospital of Lahore

Background: Among the common complications of diabetes, neuropathy has its place. About 50% of diabetics suffer from this complication. It is one of the most common cause of elevated morbidity mortality in diabetics. Duration of diabetes, its control and association with other micro vascular complications can result in an raised incidence of neuropathy in patients. Aim: To find frequency of peripheral neuropathy in newly diagnosed type 2 diabetes in a tertiary care hospital. Methods: Cross sectional study carried out in newly diagnosed patients with type II Diabetes Mellitus presented at department of Medicine, Fatima Memorial hospital, Lahore. 200 newly diagnosed type II diabetes patients who met the inclusion criteria were selected. Information was recorded on predesigned questionnaire regarding peripheral neuropathy and socio-demographic variables. Results: The mean age among peripheral neuropathy respondents was 47.05 +/- 6.37 years while it was 45.19 +/- 6.50 years among not having peripheral neuropathy. Peripheral neuropathy was seen in 42 (21%) respondents while in 158 (79%) there was no peripheral neuropathy. Gender among peripheral neuropathy showed that males were 36 and females were 06 in number; and among non-peripheral neuropathy group there were 135 males and 23 females. Most of the low income respondents were suffering from peripheral neuropathy as compared to other income groups. Post stratification regarding age and gender yields significant results within income groups while the later showed only male respondents were significant. Conclusion: This study reports that in type 2 diabetic patients diagnosed less than one year back, there is an increased prevalence of peripheral neuropathy. Male respondents were more in number than females but both had shown almost having same occurrence of peripheral neuropathy.