ANALYSIS OF FACTORS THAT INFLUENCE SHORT-TERM INCREASE IN BMI AMONG CHILDREN RECENTLY DIAGNOSED WITH DIABETES

There is extensive literature on the etiology of Type 1 diabetes mellitus (T1DM). T1DM is a disease that has levied a substantial burden on the health of millions; as such a study into the factors associated with T1DM is of utmost importance in the field of public health. It is widely believed that a person's genetic predisposition is linked with the susceptibility of T1DM. Some genes are largely unknown, while some like the HLA gene class II molecules DQ has been greatly studied. It is believed that the haplotype Non-Asp/0602 is actually protective against T1DM. The risk of Type 1 diabetes in individuals with a genetic susceptibility- homozygous non-Asp/non-Asp are at higher risk whereas the individuals with Asp/Asp are at lower risk of Type 1 diabetes. Studies have suggested that those patients who are at greatest risk genetically tend to have a low body mass index (BMI), low pro-insulin, and a higher number of positive antibodies. In the past, children diagnosed with type 1 diabetes were not overweight and actually would present with considerable weight loss and underweight. This seems to be changing. The purpose of this study is to investigate precipitating factors that are associated with short-term weight gain in children who were diagnosed with T1DM at Children's Hospital of Pittsburgh, from 2004 through 2006. We investigated the prevalence of increased BMI after 3 months of diagnosis in patients with Type 1 diabetes in relation to BMI at onset, gender, age at onset, HLA-DQ type, C-peptide, hemoglobin A1c (HbA1c) and race.BMI percentile at diagnosis was significantly different from BMI percentile at 3months, which showed an average increase from baseline of 21.5 and a standard deviation of 24.6 (p-value