Prevalence of undiagnosed dysglycemia in an emergency department observation unit

BackgroundThe proposed 2015 US Preventive Services Task Force guidelines recommend diabetes screening for individuals 45years or demonstrating other risk factors for dysglycemia. Still, many patients with dysglycemia remain undiagnosed, and opportunities for early intervention are lost. MethodsTo test novel approaches for diagnosis using the haemoglobin A(1c) (HbA(1c)) test, we screened adult patients who were admitted to an observation unit from the emergency department with no known history of pre-diabetes or diabetes. ResultsOf 256 subjects, 9% were newly diagnosed with diabetes and 52% were newly diagnosed with pre-diabetes. Of those aged 18-29years, 33% were newly diagnosed with dysglycemia, while 55% of those aged 30-44years and 70% of those aged 45years were newly diagnosed with dysglycemia. ConclusionsOur results suggest that regardless of age, a large proportion of patients in the emergency department observation unit have undiagnosed dysglycemia, an important finding given the large number of observation admissions. Copyright (c) 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.