• Cheng L Lu, Ruad Perera, Hussein Farrah, and Justin Waring.
• Department of Respiratory Medicine, Royal Perth Hospital, Perth, Western Australia, Australia.
• Intern Med J. 2019 May 1; 49 (5): 630633630-633.

BackgroundDiabetes mellitus is an important risk factor for tuberculosis (TB), and studies in high TB burden countries have shown diabetes screening to be both feasible and to have a high yield. However, scarce information is available for low TB burden countries. Diabetes screening was previously not part of our routine practice.AimTo screen and determine the prevalence of diabetes in the Western Australian Tuberculosis Control Program.MethodsWe measured HbA1c and random plasma glucose in patients with active TB. We also collected details on their demographics, TB and diabetes.ResultsA total of 105 patients was recruited over a year. Of those, 17 (16.2%) had diabetes. Seven cases (6.7%) were newly diagnosed diabetics. Age, cavitating disease and family history of diabetes were found to be significantly associated with diabetes. Multilobar disease, gender, body mass index, smear and culture positivity were not significantly different between groups.ConclusionOur study showed high prevalence of diabetes among active TB patients. Diabetes screening at diagnosis of active TB presents as a good opportunity to detect diabetes even in low prevalence country and has become part of our standard care.© 2018 Royal Australasian College of Physicians.

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