Assessing risk of skin lesions among people with diabetes: a case-control study from Uttarakhand, India

Diabetes mellitus is a non-communicable disease that affects all the body’s organ systems, including the dermatologic system. Skin lesions can cause discomfort, harm one’s quality of life (QOL), and increase treatment costs. The objective of conducting this study was to compare the proportion of dermatologic comorbidities, the direct cost of treatment, and the QOL between cases and controls. The study was conducted in a medical college hospital in the hilly region of Uttarakhand using a case-control design. Cases were recruited from the Outpatient Department (OPD) and controls from the hospital. Comparisons were made for the presence of skin diseases between 195 patients with diabetes andan equal number of age and gender-matched non-diabetics. The independent t-test was used to compare QOL and treatment cost between the two groups. The risk of skin diseases was 5.3 times higher in cases than in controls. The proportion of skin diseases in cases was 36.4% versus 9.7% in controls. Limitations: There is a probability that the QOL scores could be lower and the treatment cost higher than that observed. The proportion of skin disorders and the mean direct cost of treatment was reported to be significantly higher among cases.