High magnitude of diabetes mellitus among Active Pulmonary Tuberculosis Patients in Ethiopia

Aim: The main aim of this study was to determine the prevalence of diabetes mellitus in patients with active pulmonary tuberculosis at the University of Gondar Teaching Referral Hospital, northwest Ethiopia.
Study Design: A cross-sectional hospital-based study was performed using the WHO structured diabetic assessment protocol.
Place and Duration: The study included all active pulmonary tuberculosis patients visiting the University of Gondar Teaching Referral Hospital during the study period (October 2011 to November, 2012).
Methodology: We included 199 consecutive active pulmonary tuberculosis patients; 117 of these were male and 108 were urban dwellers. Analyses of fasting blood glucose level were carried out using blood samples collected by finger puncture. For testing significance, categorical data were compared using a chi-square test and expressed as proportion with a 95% confidence interval.
Result: The prevalence of diabetes was found to be 8.5 % [95%CI: 4.6– 12.5], which was higher (11.1%) among male than female participants (4.9%). Likewise, 10.2% of the patients were from urban and 6.6% from rural areas. The proportion of newly diagnosed diabetic cases was 52.9%, and all of them were between 25-44 years of age. The Prevalence of impaired fasting glucose was 29.6%. The prevalence of HIV co-infection in the study population was 28.6% [95%CI: 22.3 34.9] and Diabetes was 4 times higher among HIV co-infected patients than among HIV-negative tuberculosis patients. Of all patients with active tuberculosis, 146 (73.7%) were sputum smear negative for acid fast bacilli. The proportion of diabetes was 9.6% among smear positive and 8.2% among smear negative cases.
Conclusion: The prevalence of diabetes mellitus and pre-diabetes among active pulmonary tuberculosis cases was higher compared to the published prevalence of DM in the general population. Therefore, it is important to implement an active case detection of diabetes among tuberculosis patients.