109-OR: Prior Cerebrovascular Disease Was Positively Associated with Severe Diabetic Retinopathy and Diabetic Macular Edema in Type 2 Diabetes Free

Background and Purpose: Although it is well established that diabetic retinopathy (DR) and diabetic macular edema (DME) are risk factors for incident cerebrovascular disease (CVD), whether the CVD history could be a predictor of severe DR or DME remains unknown among people with type 2 diabetes. Also, the effects of aging or systolic blood pressure on incident severe DR or DME in individuals with a history of CVD remains unknown.

Methods: Severe DR and DME were defined as vision-threatening treatment-required diabetic eye diseases (TRDED). Enrolled were 31,638 Japanese patients with type 2 diabetes. We longitudinally explored the existence of such an association not only overall but also according to various factors.

Results: The main outcome of TRDED was observed in 854 (2.7%) patients during a mean follow-up of 5.3 years (5.1/1,000 person-years). Prior CVD was present in 694 of 31,638 (2.2%) patients at baseline. In a multivariate adjusted Cox regression model, prior CVD was positively associated with incident TRDED in analysis of the study population (hazard ratio, 1.63 [95% confidence interval, 1.11-2.37] overall; 1.47 [0.54, 3.99] for age ≤49 y; 1.69 [1.12, 2.55] for age ≥50 y; 1.46 [0.89, 2.39] for SBP ≤139 mmHg; 1.97 [1.09, 3.58] for SBP ≥140 mmHg). All results, including several stratified analyses, correlated with visual inspection of the corresponding Kaplan-Meier analysis with log-rank tests indicating gaps between curves for those with and without prior CVD.

Conclusions: These results indicate that CVD is a predictor of vision-threatening severe retinopathy, and suggested that they shared a common background pathophysiology. It also contributed to preventing severe visual impairment and further deterioration of the quality of life after stroke.