Tipping the balance: Haemoglobinopathies and the risk of diabetes

World Journal of Diabetes
Henry J BaldwinJeetesh V Patel

Abstract

To establish a link between the risk of diabetes with haemoglobinopathies by examining available evidence of the effects of iron and blood glucose homeostasis from molecular to epidemiological perspectives. A systematic literature search was performed using electronic literature databases using various search terms. The International Diabetes Federation World Atlas was used to generate a list of populations with high rates of diabetes. PubMed, Scopus and Google Scholar were used to identify which of these populations also had a reported prevalence of haemoglobin abnormalities. Abnormalities in iron homeostasis leads to increases in reactive oxygen species in the blood. This promotes oxidative stress which contributes to peripheral resistance to insulin in two ways: (1) reduced insulin/insulin receptor interaction; and (2) β-cell dysfunction. Hepcidin is crucial in terms of maintaining appropriate amounts of iron in the body and is in turn affected by haemoglobinopathies. Hepcidin also has other metabolic effects in places such as the liver but so far the extent of these is not well understood. It does however directly control the levels of serum ferritin. High serum ferritin is found in obese patients and those with diabetes an...Continue Reading

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