Glycemic parameters in new-onset diabetes during COVID-19 pandemic are more severe than new-onset diabetes before the pandemic: NOD COVID India study

Amerta, Ghosh; Anjana, Ranjit Mohan; Shanthi Rani, Coimbatore Subramanian; Rani, Saravanan Jeba; Ritesh, Gupta; Alka, Jha; Vimal, Gupta; Atu, Luthra; Suhai, Durrani; Shafi, Kuchay; Koel, Dutta; Kanika, Tyagi; Ranjit, Unnikrishnan; Srivastava, Brijendra Kumar; Ramu, Muthu; Sastry, Nadiminty Ganapathi; Gupta, Prasanna Kumar; Umasankari, Ganesan; Jayashri, Ramamoorthy; Mohan, Viswanathan; Misra, Anoop

BACKGROUND AND AIMS: It is not known if new onset diabetes during Coronavirus-19 disease (COVID-19; NOD COVID) is phenotypically or biochemically different than new onset diabetes before COVID-19 (NOD). METHODS: All adults diagnosed with new onset diabetes from during the time of COVID-19 were compared with new onset diabetes prior to COVID-19, from two tertiary care hospitals in Chennai and Delhi. RTPCR test for SARS-CoV-2 virus was done as appropriate, and COVID-19 antibody test was done in all other NOD COVID patients. RESULT: A total of 555 patients with new onset diabetes were included in the study (282 NOD and 273 NOD COVID patients). Patients with NOD COVID had higher fasting and post prandial blood glucose and glycated hemoglobin vs. NOD patients. Both the groups had high average body mass index; ∼28 kg/m2. Interestingly, fasting C-peptide levels were significantly higher in the NOD COVID group vs. NOD group. There was no difference in C-peptide or glycemic parameters between the COVID-19 antibody positive and negative NOD COVID cases. CONCLUSION: Individuals who were diagnosed with diabetes during COVID-19 epidemic (NOD COVID) do not significantly differ from those diagnosed before COVID-19 in symptomatology, phenotype, and C-peptide levels but they had more severe glycemia.