Are the different diabetes subgroups correlated with all-cause, cancer-related, and cardiovascular-related mortality?

Context: Numerous studies have shown that cardiovascular disease (CVD) represents the most important cause of mortality among people with diabetes mellitus (DM). However, no studies have evaluated the risk of CVD-related mortality among different DM subgroups. Objective: We aimed to examine all-cause, CVD-related, and cancer-related mortality for different DM subgroups. Design, Setting, Patients, and Interventions: We included participants (age ≥ 20 years) from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey III (NHANES III) data set. We evaluated the risks of all-cause and cause-specific (CVD and cancer) mortality among 5 previously defined diabetes subgroups: severe autoimmune diabetes (SAID), severe insulin-deficient diabetes (SIDD), severe insulin-resistant diabetes (SIRD), mild obesity-related diabetes (MOD), and mild age-related diabetes (MARD). Primary Outcome Measure: The hazard ratios (HRs) for all-cause and cause-specific (CVD and cancer) mortality were measured for each of the 5 DM subgroups. We also evaluated the odds ratios (ORs) for retinopathy and nephropathy in each subgroup. Results: A total of 712 adults were enrolled and the median follow-up time was 12.71 years (range, 0.25-18.08 years). The number of deaths in the 5 subgroups (SAID, SIDD, SIRD, MOD, and MARD) were 50, 75, 64, 7, and 18, respectively, and the number of CVD-related deaths in the 5 subgroups was 29, 30, 26, 2, and 11, respectively. Compared to the MOD subgroup, the adjusted HRs and 95% CIs of CVD-related mortality for the SAID, SIDD, SIRD, and MARD subgroups were 3.23 (95% CI, 0.77-13.61), 2.87 (95% CI, 0.68-12.06), 2.23 (95% CI, 0.53-9.50), and 4.75 (95% CI, 1.05-21.59), respectively (the HR for the MARD subgroup had a P value of .04). In addition, compared to the MARD subgroup, the adjusted ORs and 95% CIs for retinopathy in the SAID and SIDD groups were 2.38 (95% CI, 1.13-5.01, P = .02) and 3.34 (95% CI, 1.17-6.88, P = .001), respectively.The ORs for nephropathy were nonsignificant. Conclusions: Our study of patients from the NHANES III data set indicated that among the different DM subgroups, the MARD subgroup tended to have a higher CVD-related mortality than the MOD subgroup. The all-cause and cancer-related mortality rates were similar across the different diabetes subgroups. In addition, compared to the MARD subgroup, the SAID and SIDD subgroups had a higher retinopathy risk, but there was no difference in nephropathy among the subgroups.