Aim: To investigate the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic and its preventive measures on the glycemic and lipid control in people with diabetes mellitus (DM).
Materials and methods: We conducted this retrospective cohort study from April 2019 to March 2021; we termed the period from April 2019 to March 2020 as the pre-COVID-19 period, and the period from April 2020 to March 2021 as the COVID-19 period, and divided each of these two periods into four quarters.
Results: In the 1st quarter of the COVID period, when the Japanese government declared the first public health emergency, 3,465 people with diabetes mellitus were receiving treatment, which was 10.4% lower than that in the pre-COVID period. The annual mean HbA1c level was significantly elevated in the COVID-19 period. The annual mean total cholesterol (TC) and triglyceride (TG) levels were also significantly higher in the COVID-19 period. Although there were no significant differences in the glycemic control or annual medication between the two periods in people with type 1 diabetes mellitus, the annual mean HbA1c, TC, and TG levels were significantly higher in the COVID-19 period in people with type 2 diabetes mellitus. Furthermore, a significant increase in the percentage of prescriptions for glinides, biguanides, sodium-glucose cotransporter 2 inhibitors, and glucagon-like peptide-1 receptor agonists for people with type 2 diabetes mellitus was observed in the COVID period.
Conclusions: It appears from our study that COVID-19 and its preventive measures had a negative impact on the glycemic and lipid control in people with diabetes mellitus.
Keywords: COVID-19, Glycemic control, Lipid control.
© 2023 The Authors. Journal of Diabetes Investigation published by Asian Association for the Study of Diabetes (AASD) and John Wiley & Sons Australia, Ltd.