Prevalence of diabetes mellitus and IFG in the prospective cohort 'PONS' study - baseline assessment

The aim of this cross-sectional study was to assess the prevalence of diabetes mellitus and impaired fasting glucose (IFG) in the Polish-Norwegian Study (PONS) population in Poland. The presented results are part of the PONS project, and cover information from 3,854 people aged 45-64 (2,567 females and 1,287 males) who are inhabitants of Świętokrzyski Province. In the study group there were 62.8% participants with normoglycaemia, 28.9% participants with IFG and 8.4% participants with diabetes. In those with diabetes, there were 95 participants (2.5%) whose diabetes was unknown prior to this study. Among 5.9% patients with known diabetes 52.9% of the participants had a fasting blood glucose level of ≥ 126 mg%. There were 46.8% males and 70.8% females with normoglycaemia, 41.0% males and 22.8% females with IFG, and 12.2% males and 6.4% females with diabetes. The prevalence of diabetes was higher in participants in the older age group (55-64) compared to younger participants (45-54). The prevalence of diabetes decreased with increasing education and was higher among overweight or obese participants compared to normal weight participants. The prevalence of diabetes mellitus in study population was generally high, but especially high in males, and the awareness of diabetes in the population was generally low. Among participants with known diabetes more than half was not well controlled.