Diabetes mellitus is a widespread endocrine disease with severe impact on health systems worldwide. Increased serum glucose causes damage to a wide range of cell types, including endothelial cells, neurons, and renal cells, but also keratinocytes and fibroblasts. Skin disorders can be found in about one third of all people with diabetes and frequently occur before the diagnosis, thus playing an important role in the initial recognition of underlying disease. Noninfectious as well as infectious diseases have been described as dermatologic manifestations of diabetes mellitus. Moreover, diabetic neuropathy and angiopathy may also affect the skin. Pruritus, necrobiosis lipoidica, scleredema adultorum of Buschke, and granuloma annulare are examples of frequent noninfectious skin diseases. Bacterial and fungal skin infections are more frequent in people with diabetes. Diabetic neuropathy and angiopathy are responsible for diabetic foot syndrome and diabetic dermopathy. Furthermore, antidiabetic therapies may provoke dermatologic adverse events. Treatment with insulin may evoke local reactions like lipohypertrophy, lipoatrophy and both instant and delayed type allergy. Erythema multiforme, leukocytoclastic vasculitis, drug eruptions, and photosensitivity have been described as adverse reactions to oral antidiabetics. The identification of lesions may be crucial for the first diagnosis and for proper therapy of diabetes.
Background
Autoimmune bullous diseases (AIBD) are rare disorders characterized by autoantibody formation against components of adhesion molecules; in pemphigoid diseases (PD), these are proteins of hemidesmosomes and basement membrane, important for cell‐matrix adhesion in skin and/or mucous membranes. Incidences of these diseases vary considerably between different populations.
Objectives
To establish a registry prospectively recruiting all AIBD patients in a geographically well‐defined region in Northern Germany (Schleswig‐Holstein).
Methods
Only patients with verified disease (by clinical presentation, histology, direct and/or indirect immunofluorescence and /or ELISA) living in Schleswig‐Holstein were included. Incidences of PD were estimated based on the total number of inhabitants in Schleswig‐Holstein, stratified by birth year and sex.
Results
Of 67 patients with PD [35 male, 32 female, mean age 75 (standard deviation 14.3 years)], 83% were patients with bullous pemphigoid [n = 56, 28 male, 28 female, mean age 78 (SD 9.9)]. The resulting crude incidences were 23.4 patients/million/year for all pemphigoid patients, 19.6 patients/million/year for bullous pemphigoid (age‐standardized 16.9 patients/million/year) with a strong increase in bullous pemphigoid patients in the age group of 85–90 years with 262 patients/million/year. Incidences for bullous pemphigoid were higher in urban compared to rural areas. Other PD (mucous membrane pemphigoid, linear IgA disease, anti‐p200 pemphigoid) were less frequent with crude incidences of 2.1, 1.0 and 0.7 patients/million/year, respectively.
Conclusions
This study prospectively analyses the incidence of PD in a carefully defined geographical area. The highest incidence among PD patients was found for bullous pemphigoid. The incidence of bullous pemphigoid is considerably increased compared to previous reports and reveals regional differences. Further studies are needed in order to clarify these findings.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.