Alcohol Has Become Important Cause of Death in Patients With Type I Diabetes

Alcohol has become an important cause of death in people with Type I diabetes, according to a new study.

The study included more than 17,000 patients in Finland with Type 1 diabetes, who were 30 or younger when the study began. The researchers followed them for an average of 21 years. They found 39 percent of deaths among patients who developed diabetes between the ages of 15 to 29 were due to alcohol- and drug-related causes, Medical News Today reports.

Overall, the researchers concluded, survival of people with early onset Type 1 diabetes, who developed the disease by age 14, has improved over time, while survival of people who develop the disease after that age has deteriorated since the 1980s.

“This highlights the importance of permanent and long-lasting doctor-patient relationships, close supervision, and guidance on the short-term and long-term effects of alcohol in young people with Type 1 diabetes, especially in our alcohol permissive culture,” the researchers write in the British Medical Journal.