Prevalence of Diabetic Retinopathy among Diabetics: A Hospital Based Study at Ashraff Memorial Hospital, Kalmunai

Abstract

Diabetic Retinopathy and diabetics are two highly associated severe diseases in human. This study assesses the risk of getting Diabetic Retinopathy among the Diabetic patients in the Kalmunai region. In this hospital based cross sectional study, all the diabetic patients who were attending to the diabetic clinic of the Ashraff memorial hospital from January 2014 to December 2014 were screened for Diabetic Retinopathy and their demographic details were recorded. Obtained information was analyzed for estimating the risk for Diabetic Retinopathy among the diabetic patients and it was estimated as 13.16%. No difference in risk of getting Diabetic Retinopathy was observed among different age group, educated level and gender. Risk of getting Diabetic Retinopathy increases with the increase of the duration suffered by the diabetic. The relative risk of getting Diabetic Retinopathy for patients with diabetic for more 12 years is 3.55 times greater compared to the fresh diabetic patients.