Prevalence and Severity of Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease in People with Type 2 Diabetes: A Cross-Sectional Study

Objective: The aim of the study was to determine and evaluate the prevalence of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) in patients with type 2 diabetes and the impact of diabetes on lung function and the severity of the COPD. Materials and methods: This was a retrospective observational study conducted in a private clinic setup among 1200 patients and was performed according to the Strengthening the Reporting of Observational Studies in Epidemiology Statement (STROBE). Chronic Obstructive Lung Disease (GOLD) criteria, 2023 were used to diagnose COPD and for diabetes mellitus (DM) were executed according to the American Diabetes Association (ADA) and International Diabetes Federation (IDF) consensus statement. Results: The prevalence of type 2 diabetes (T2D) was 27% among 1200 COPD patients. Among 335 patients with diabetes 37% had newly detected T2D. Prevalence in mild, moderate, severe, and very severe COPD among patients having documented T2D was 14.6%, 18.8%, 37%, and 29.5%, respectively. Furthermore, among diabetes patients 7.5% were having HbA1c < 7%, 63.9% were having HbA1c 7–10% and 28.6% were having HbA1c > 10%. As compared to people without diabetes (56.64 ± 3.55), in patients with diabetes (46.22 ± 4.19) there was a severe decline in lung function (mean FEV1) and it was statistically significant (p = 0.001). Comorbidities, as shown by multivariate Cox proportional hazards analysis, including hypertension (HR, 1.902; 95% CI, 1.261–2.403), dyslipidemia (HR, 1.391; 95% CI, 1.172–1.198), cerebrovascular disease (HR, 1.532; 95% CI, 1.132–2.008), coronary artery disease (HR, 1.427; 95% CI, 1.079–1.830), kidney disease (HR, 1.006, 95% CI, 0.833–1.397) and liver disease (HR, 1.083, 95% CI, 0.821–1.427) were independent clinical factors associated with T2D. Conclusions: Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease is one of the comorbidities found in patients with T2D. A significant number of cases of new-onset diabetes are observed among patients with pre-existing COPD. Therefore, the outcome of this research advocates that targeted surveillance and management of diabetes are important in clinical care of the COPD population.