Objective: The aim of this study was to determine whether long-term cardiovascular risk differs in type 2 diabetic patients compared with first acute myocardial infarction patients in a Mediterranean region, considering therapy, diabetes duration, and glycemic control.
Research design and methods: A prospective population-based cohort study with 10-year follow-up was performed in 4,410 patients aged 30-74 years: 2,260 with type 2 diabetes without coronary heart disease recruited in 53 primary health care centers and 2,150 with first acute myocardial infarction without diabetes recruited in 10 hospitals. We compared coronary heart disease incidence and cardiovascular mortality rates in myocardial infarction patients and diabetic patients, including subgroups by diabetes treatment, duration, and A1C.
Results: The adjusted hazard ratios (HRs) for 10-year coronary heart disease incidence and for cardiovascular mortality were significantly lower in men and women with diabetes than in myocardial infarction patients: HR 0.54 (95% CI 0.45-0.66) and 0.28 (0.21-0.37) and 0.26 (0.19-0.36) and 0.16 (0.10-0.26), respectively. All diabetic patient subgroups had significantly fewer events than myocardial infarction patients: the HR of cardiovascular mortality ranged from 0.15 (0.09-0.26) to 0.36 (0.24-0.54) and that of coronary heart disease incidence ranged from 0.34 (0.26-0.46) to 0.56 (0.43-0.72).
Conclusions: Lower long-term cardiovascular risk was found in type 2 diabetic and all subgroups analyzed compared with myocardial infarction patients. These results do not support equivalence in coronary disease risk for diabetic and myocardial infarction patients.