Changes in the diabetic retinopathy epidemiology after 14 years in a population of Type 1 and 2 diabetic patients after the new diabetes mellitus diagnosis criteria and a more strict control of the patients.

OBJECTIVE: To determine the differences observed between two transversal studies separated 14 years.
METHODS: The sample was obtained by randomized hazard selection of 1157 Type 2 and 93 Type 1 diabetic patients in the 2006 study, and 741 Type 2 and 76 Type 1 diabetic patients in the 1993 study. We evaluate the prevalence of diabetic retinopathy (DR), microalbuminuria, overt nephropathy, and its risk factors.
RESULTS: In Type 2 diabetic patients, we observed a decrease of the prevalence of DR from 39.41% in the 1993 study to 27.48% in the 2006 study, but we did not observe it in Type 1 diabetic patients-35.52% in 1993 to 36.55% in 2006. The diabetic macular edema prevalence is similar in both studies-7.15% in 1993 and 7.86% in 2006 in Type 2 patients, and 11.84-12.90% in Type 1; microalbuminuria decreased in Type 2 but not in Type 1 patients (from 22.13% to 17.02% in Type 2, and 28.33-27.95% in Type 1); overt nephropathy decreased in both types of diabetic patients (in Type 1, decreased from 11.84% to 8.60% and, in Type 2, from 8.63% to 6.74%). We may observe a decrease in the number of patients with blindness, from 11.20% to 4.90% in Type 2, and from 9.21% to 7.52% in Type 1 patients.
CONCLUSIONS: We may observe a decrease in the prevalence of DR, overt nephropathy, and blindness in Type 1 and 2 patients and a decrease in the prevalence of microalbuminuria only in Type 2 patients.