South African Medical Journal
Journal / South African Medical Journal / Vol. 47 No. 9 (1973) / Articles

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Published:

Apr 12, 2018

Issue

Vol. 47 No. 9 (1973)

Section

Articles

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Author Biographies

WPU Jackson

Endocrine Research Group, Department of Medicine, University of Cape Town and Groote Schuur Hospital, Cape Town

W van Mieghem

Endocrine Research Group, Department of Medicine, University of Cape Town and Groote Schuur Hospital, Cape Town

N Marine

Endocrine Research Group, Department of Medicine, University of Cape Town and Groote Schuur Hospital, Cape Town

P Keller

Endocrine Research Group, Department of Medicine, University of Cape Town and Groote Schuur Hospital, Cape Town

I Edelstein

Endocrine Research Group, Department of Medicine, University of Cape Town and Groote Schuur Hospital, Cape Town

WPU Jackson

W van Mieghem

N Marine

P Keller

I Edelstein

Abstract

A community of Tamil-speaking Indians in Cape Town was found to have an extremely high prevalence of diabetes - 37% over the age of 25 years. Members of this community were considerably inbred; other social and dietary factors did not appear relevant when comparison was made with other Indian groups in Cape Town. The newly-discovered diabetics were younger than the already known diabetics. Re-examination five years later indicated that 11 (34%) of 32 subjects whose glucose tolerance tests (GTT) had been initially normal, had become diabetic, and that the mean GTT values of originally normal and originally diabetic subjects had greatly increased. Prolonged GTTs did not indicate any particular tendency to reactive hypoglycaemia in this potentially diabetic community. Growth hormone levels tended to be high and poorly suppressed compared with those of a control group. We conclude that genetic influences may be extremely important in determining the incidence of maturity-onset diabetes, at least among certain communities.

S. Afr. Med. J., 48, 1839 (1974).

Journal Identifiers

eISSN: 2078-5135
print ISSN: 0256-9574