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Prevalence and Trends in Diabetes

Still on the upswing in US?

Publish date:: September 22, 2015

The estimated prevalence of diabetes was 12% to 14% among US adults in 2011-12, with a higher prevalence among participants who were non-Hispanic black, non-Hispanic Asian, and Hispanic. Between 1988-1994 and 2011-12, the prevalence of diabetes increased in the overall population and in all subgroups evaluated. This according to cross-sectional surveys that included 2,781 adults from 2011-12 used to estimate recent prevalence and an additional 23,634 adults from 1988-2010 used to estimate trends. Survey details also revealed:

• Unadjusted prevalence was 14% for total diabetes, 9% for diagnosed diabetes, 5.2% for undiagnosed diabetes, and 38% for prediabetes in the overall 2011-12 population.

• Compared with non-Hispanic white participants, the age-standardized prevalence of total diabetes was higher among non-Hispanic black participants (21.8%), non-Hispanic Asian participants (20.6%), and Hispanic participants (22.6%).

• Age-standardized prevalence of total diabetes increased from 9.8% in 1988-94 to 10.8% in 2001-02, to 12.4% in 2011-12 and increased significantly in every age group, in both sexes, in every racial/ethnic group, by all education levels, and in all poverty income ratio tertiles.

Citation: Menke A, Casagrande S, Geiss L, Cowie CC. Prevalence of and trends in diabetes among adults in the United States, 1988-2012. JAMA. 2015;314(10):1021-1029. doi:10.1001/jama.2015.10029.

Commentary: These statistics, while not surprising, are sobering and really highlight diabetes as the health issue of the next 20 years. It has been estimated that if the current trend continues, approximately one out of every three infants born in this past decade will develop diabetes at some point during their lives¹. It is also important to note that currently over a third of the population has pre-diabetes, and the best approach to decrease the progression of pre-diabetes to diabetes is intensive lifestyle modification with diet and exercise². This is an area of preventive medicine where we need to increase our efforts to help patients see the wisdom and possibility of lifestyle modification to stem the tide of diabetes. —Neil Skolnik, MD

1. Boyle JP, Thompson TJ, Gregg EW, et al. Projection of the year 2050 burden of diabetes in the US adult population: dynamic modeling of incidence, mortality, and pre-diabetes prevalence Popul Health Metr. 2010;8:1-12.

2. Knowler WC, Barrett-Connor E, Fowler SE, et al. Reduction in the incidence of type 2 diabetes with lifestyle intervention or metformin. N Engl J Med 2002; 346:393-403.

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