Prevalence of dialysis-related amyloidosis in diabetic patients

It has recently been shown that beta(2)-microglobulin isolated from amyloid deposits in dialysis patients is modified by advanced glycation (AGE). In this context it appeared of interest to examine in a cross-sectional multicentre study whether dialysis-related amyloidosis, as evaluated by X-ray assessment of cysts in the metacarpal bones, was different in diabetic patients on maintenance haemodialysis for more than 5 years time compared with matched nondiabetic controls. We evaluated the hand skeleton of 75 diabetic patients (9 type I, 66 type II; 35 male, 40 female; median age 64 years, range 31-86; median duration of dialysis 7 years, range 5-17), They were compared with 150 patients without diabetes mellitus who were matched for age, gender and duration of dialysis. Hand X-rays were centrally evaluated by one radiologist unaware of the underlying clinical diagnosis. The overall frequency of amyloid cysts was 9/75 (12%) in diabetic patients (95% confidence interval 4.6-19.3%) and 28/150 (19%) in matched controls (95% confidence interval 12.4-24.9%). The results indicate that diabetes mellitus does not confer an increased risk of dialysis-related amyloid cysts. The results are of interest with respect to the mechanism of amyloid formation.