Recent life events, gender differences, and the control of insulin-dependent diabetes mellitus. A 2-year follow-up study.

In an earlier study of patients with insulin-dependent diabetes mellitus (IDDM), males who reported predominantly negative life events over the previous year and had a poorer social support situation showed poorer HbA1C values than those who reported fewer or no negative life events. For the females it was found that the greater the number of life events reported, especially positive ones, the greater the change for the better was HbA1C over the event year studied. The present study aimed at following up, during the next event year period, various gender-specific patterns obtained in the previous study. For the males, negative life events and HbA1C values were found to be positively related this second event year as well. In addition, more negative life events were reported by those males who, in the previous study, were defined as high-negative eventers. In contrast, for the females, no significant correlations were obtained between life events and HbA1C values for the second event year. The results are discussed in terms of possible differences in psychosocial environment and coping strategies between males and females.