Prevalence of diabetes mellitus and impaired glucose tolerance in beta-thalassemia patients with and without hepatitis C virus infection.

Introduction: Impaired glucose tolerance and diabetes are well known complications in beta-Thalassaemic multitransfused patients (beta-Th). Iron overload and chronic liver disease, viral infections and/or genetic factors may play an important role in the development of glucose intolerance. The present study aimed to investigate whether in beta-thalassemic patients the hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection may be an additional risk factor for the development of diabetes mellitus.
Patients and Methods: The study included 98 beta-Th multitransfused patients, 50 females and 48 males (mean age 15.9 -/+ 4 years; range: 8-32 years). Forty six (47%) patients were seropositive for HCV by ELISA. Six patients were diagnosed as diabetic before the present study. In the remaining oral glucose tolerance test was performed according to the recommendations of National Diabetes Data Group. Prevalence of diabetes and impaired glucose tolerance were compared in HCV-seropositive and HCV-seronegative groups.
Results: The prevalence of diabetes in HCV (+) adult beta-Th patients was higher compared to HCV (-) patients (15.2% vs. 1.9%, p: 0.02). No difference was observed in HCV-RNA (-) in the younger group of beta-Th patients.
Conclusions: The prevalence of diabetes in adult thalassemic patients is significantly increased by HCV infection, but there is no difference between HCV(+) group and HCV(-) group in age range of 8-15 years. It is probable that the existence of hemosiderosis makes the effect of HCV infection on glucose metabolism clinically more evident.