Thyroid disease in diabetics

Abstract

Among a diabetic clinic population of 5,000 there were 113 patients (141%) with concurrent clinical thyroid dysfunction (56 hyperthyroid, 57 hypothyroid). Seventy-one (62.8%) of these patients were insulin-dependent and diabetes preceded thyroid disease in 85 (75-2%). Twenty patients were given carbimazole for two or more years and of these 15 (75%) relapsed, a percentage not significantly different from that seen in non-diabetic patients. The value of screening diabetic patients for evidence of thyroid dysfunction is discussed. © 1982 The Fellowship of Postgraduate Medicine.