The risk of death appears to be doubled for patients with type 1 diabetes after undergoing CABG (coronary artery bypass graft) surgery.
Type 2 diabetes patients, however, had only a slightly worse mortality prognosis following CABG surgery.
This research was conducted by Swedish researchers, who analysed 39,235 individuals that had enrolled in the SWEDEHEART registry – a national registry of coronary artery disease care and valvular interventions.
The patients underwent CABG surgery between 2003 and 2013. 725 patients had type 1 diabetes, while 8,208 had type 2 diabetes. The mean age of the patients was 67 years old.
6,765 patients died during a follow-up period of 5.9 years, which included 21 per cent of the 725 patients with type 1 diabetes and 19 per cent of those with type 2 diabetes.
Double the risk
The risk of death for patients with type 1 diabetes was increased more than twofold compared to those without diabetes. This risk was increased by 11 per cent for type 2 patients.
The correlation between type 1 diabetes and non cardiovascular mortality was stronger than with cardiovascular-related mortality. Type 2 diabetes was not associated significantly with cardiovascular-related death.
Lead researcher Dr Martin Holzman, Karolinska University Hospital, Stockholm, Sweden stated: “Our data indicate that patients with type 1 diabetes mellitus are at high risk for adverse outcomes after CABG and should be closely followed up and that all possible measures to mitigate their risk of death or recurrent cardiovascular events should be instituted.”
David P. Taggart, MD, PhD of the department of cardiac surgery, Oxford University Hospitals Trust in Oxford, wrote in an editorial: “The results could be confidently applied to patients with [diabetes] undergoing CABG in similar developed health care systems.
“The main message of the study is that the ‘low-hanging fruit’ is the need to focus on both the increased incidence of CV and non-CV deaths in patients with type 1 diabetes.”

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