Diabetes mellitus e ingreso hospitalario

to characterize the diabetic population admitted in the internal medicine service of "ciro redondo" hospital, it was designed a descriptive and prospective study of the patients hospitalized with this diagnosis during 1998. general data, data refering to the disease and the results of a physical examination were collected in a form prepared to this end. of 100 patients that were admitted during this period, 27 were excluded (19 for not cooperating and 8 because they had already been analyzed in a previous study). the group of analysis was composed of 73 patients. average age was 59.1 ± 14.6 and the time of evaluation was 12.3 ± 9.6 years. the systolic arterial pressure was 134.9 ± 28.6 and the diastolic was 78.1 ± 13.3 mm of hg. females predominated (67.1 %), as well as the white (78.1 %) and the non-insulin dependent diabetes (87.7 %). sepsis and discontrol were the main causes of admission, with 22 (30.1 %) and 16 (21.9 %) patients, respectively. arterial hypertension and ischemic heart disease had the highest incidence within the personal pathological history. of the total of patients, 38.4 % showed some neurologic alteration suggestive of diabetic polyneuropathy, 6.9 % had undergone amputation and other 6.9 % had ulcerations of the lower limbs. the level of information of the patients about the disease and its complications proved to be deficient