Children with Type 2 Diabetes are at a higher risk of developing vision problems.

More young people are getting serious diabetes-related health complications, such as severe eye impairment.

Over the last decade, diabetes has increased at an alarming rate among young individuals. According to a research published this year by the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases, type 1 diabetes diagnoses grew by 45 percent among Americans aged 19 and younger between 2001 and 2017, while type 2 diabetes cases increased by 95.3 percent.

Serious diabetes-related health consequences, such as severe vision impairment, are becoming more common among young individuals.

Diabetes has developed at an alarming rate among young people during the previous decade. Type 1 diabetes diagnoses surged by 45 percent among Americans aged 19 and younger between 2001 and 2017, according to a study published this year by the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases, while type 2 diabetes cases increased by 95.3 percent.

Patricia Bai, the study's lead author and a medical student at the Mayo Clinic Alix School of Medicine in Scottsdale, Arizona, tells Everyday Health that she was startled by how much more probable type 2 diabetes patients were to develop retinopathy than type 1 diabetes patients.

"When compared to previous research, we discovered a higher prevalence of retinopathy in our type 2 sample." However, because our study analyzed each patient's chart for up to 40 years of age when accessible, this could be the result of prolonged follow-up intervals," says Bai.

Diabetes retinopathy, proliferative diabetic retinopathy (a more advanced form of the illness), and the necessity for pars plana vitrectomy (a frequent type of retina surgery) all happened sooner in children with T2D than in children with T1D, according to Bai and her co-researchers at the Mayo Clinic.

The report also revealed that the probability of progressive retinopathy before puberty is quite low. The study group's average age at diagnosis was around 12 years old.

Jean Lawrence, a doctor of science and program director in the division of diabetes, endocrinology, and metabolic diseases at the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases (NIDDK), suggests that certain risk factors may be at play as to why type 2 diabetes cases have increased so much more than type 1 diabetes cases.

While type 1 diabetes cannot be prevented, risk factors for type 2 diabetes include significant weight gain, obesity, and a sedentary lifestyle.

Dr. Lawrence, who was not engaged in this study, said, "Childhood obesity climbed from 13.9 percent in 1999–2000 to 18.5 percent in 2015–2016." "Other variables that may contribute to an increase in type 2 diabetes include maternal obesity and exposure to environmental toxins."

She points out that the findings from SEARCH for Diabetes in Youth, a national multicenter study targeted at learning more about diabetes in children and young adults, were corroborated in this study. At an average of eight years after diabetes diagnosis for both groups, the prevalence of diabetic retinopathy was substantially higher in people with type 2 diabetes (9.1%) than in participants with type 1 diabetes (5.6%) in the SEARCH trial.

Jennifer K. Sun, MD, an associate professor of ophthalmology at Harvard Medical School in Boston, emphasized the need for more research into diabetic retinopathy in young people in an accompanying editorial, noting that cases of T1D are expected to nearly triple among young people by 2050, while cases of T2D are expected to quadruple.

Future research, according to Dr. Sun, could disclose distinctions between T1D and T2D, explaining the risk differences between the two types of diabetes and revealing therapeutic targets to protect eyesight in diabetic adolescents.

"These findings suggest that children with T2D may require ophthalmoscopy assessments at least as frequently as or more frequently than children to prevent significant ocular problems," the scientists stated. According to Bai, the findings highlight the need of distinguishing between the two disorders when discussing retinopathy screening recommendations with patients and families.

These findings, according to Lawrence, serve as a "sharp reminder" of the importance of diabetes prevention and, if that isn't possible, "the importance of early intervention strategies to mitigate the impact of diabetes early in the course of the disease, focused on the management of glucose as well as other health conditions such as blood pressure."

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